Union Minister Amit Shah on Monday announced that a cooperative life insurance company will be established to expand the business areas of cooperatives and also said the services of ‘Bharat Taxi’ would be increased to 500 cities in the next two years.
At an event in the national capital to mark the fifth Foundation Day of the Ministry of Cooperation, he stressed eradicating corruption in the appointments of professionals to enhance credibility in India’s cooperative ecosystem.
Shah, the Cooperation Minister, said the establishment of the ministry has given a new “lifeline” to India’s cooperative movement, which was a “neglected movement” during the Congress regime.
India has around 8.5 lakh cooperatives with more than 30 crore members.
Shah highlighted that the ministry has taken many policy initiatives to make the cooperative system modern, transparent, technology-enabled, and competitive.
The minister said that ride-hailing platform ‘Bharat Taxi’, which was launched under the cooperative model, has been doing well and would be expanded into 500 cities in the next two years.
On similar lines to Bharat Taxi, Shah said: “We will be setting up a life insurance company in the cooperative sector. This will help in the growth of cooperatives in the insurance sector”.
He mentioned that IFFCO-TOKIO, a joint venture of fertiliser cooperative IFFCO, is already in the insurance business. In India, there are 26 life insurance companies.
Bharat Taxi is an initiative of Sahakar Taxi Cooperative Ltd, a driver-centric mobility platform based on the cooperative model. At present, Bharat Taxi has 6.37 lakh registered drivers and 35.77 lakh registered customers.
The service is operational in Delhi-NCR, Gujarat, Lucknow, Chandigarh, Mumbai, Jaipur, and Kanpur and will soon be launched in Ranchi, Patna, Guwahati, Bhopal, Kolkata, Indore, and Nagpur in the next few months, according to an official statement.
Addressing the event, Shah said a national cooperative was formed especially for seed production and expressed confidence that it will emerge as the country’s largest non-governmental seed production organisation in three years.
The minister noted that the cooperative organisations have entered into many new sectors, expanding beyond dairy, sugar, fertiliser and banking businesses.
Nearly 20 per cent of agricultural credit, 35 per cent of fertiliser distribution, and 31 per cent of sugar production are being carried out through cooperatives, he said.
Shah mentioned that model bye-laws, which enable PACS (primary agricultural credit societies) to undertake 25-plus business activities, have now been adopted by all states, including West Bengal.
According to the statement, these PACS now function beyond credit, covering retail, storage, healthcare, fuel, and digital services. As many as 394 PACS have applied for retail fuel outlets, and 3 outlets have been commissioned. More than 54,000 PACS are functioning as Common Service Centres while 4,248 PACS are approved for Jan Aushadhi Kendras.
Listing out the initiatives, Shah said the ministry has identified the problems as well as opportunities in this sector. A database of the cooperative sector has been created which will help in identifying the gaps and enable expansion of cooperatives.
Shah mentioned that ‘Tribhuvan’ Sahkari University is being established at Anand in Gujarat, which will address the human resource problem.
He said trained professionals in banking, dairy, marketing, agriculture, fertilizers, and other areas of cooperation will be prepared from this university. “These professionals will be appointed based on merit. Our goal is to implement professional management in a phased manner from primary cooperative societies to top institutions. This will increase transparency in appointments, improve work efficiency, and also put an effective check on corruption related to appointments,” Shah said.
“By eliminating corruption in appointments, the cooperative sector can win people’s trust,” he said.
The minister expressed confidence that the cooperative sector would play a key role in making ‘Viksit Bharat’ by 2047. Shah emphasised the promotion of organic farming and reducing theuse of chemical fertilisers.
“We are bringing 100 per cent circular economy in the sugar and dairy sectors. Through this, manure that can serve as an alternative to DAP will be produced. This indigenous manure will be cheaper than DAP and better in quality, and will provide greater benefit to fields,” he said.
Shah appealed to the farmers to give up DAP (DI-ammonium phosphate) and accept and adopt this new manure in the coming days.
Elaborating more, the minister said 50 important amendments have been made to the Multi-State Cooperative Societies Act, 2002, making the entire cooperative system more transparent and democratic.
A total of nine national-level cooperative societies have been formed, including three new ones.
