With cash credit co-operative societies mushrooming in the state and several among them failing, the government is considering a ban on registration of new credit societies for a period of five years, said Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on Tuesday.
He said that the ban is being proposed to prevent promoters from misusing depositors’ money. “There are too many credit societies of which barely three or four are doing something different. Most are doing the same business of raising money from depositors and then closing down due to large debt,” said the Chief Minister.
He added that new credit societies in future will be stopped and individuals who wish to set up co-operative credit societies will be asked to take over the defunct ones. New non-Goan credit societies will also be denied entry.
Speaking at a workshop on strategy for comprehensive development of co-operative sector in Goa, Sawant also said that the government is proposing to amend the state Co-operative Societies Act so as to exclude housing societies and self-help group (SHG) societies from it.
Of the 4,805 co-operatives in the state, 2,408 are housing co-operative societies and 1,324 SHG co-operatives which do not need to be governed by the Act, observed the Chief Minister. He indicated that only co-operatives that deal with people’s money should be under the ambit of the Act.
The Chief Minister was speaking in the presence of Govind Gaude, Minister for Co-operation; W R Murthy, secretary, Co-operation; Menino D’Souza, state registrar; Krishna Chowdhury, chief executive director, National Co-operative Development Corporation (NCDC); Deepa Srivastava, director, NCDC and senior government officials.
Gaude said that while the state has made a provision of Rs 50 lakh in the budget, the co-operative department would be placing a demand for Rs 25 crore in the supplementary budget. “The government is trying to revive the co-operative sector and instructions have been issued to the state ROC to monitor erring societies and take action when necessary,” said Gaude.