THE NEW CENTRE OF COOPERATION

The new cooperation ministry has raised alarm in states and invited restraining comments from the Supreme Court but a ‘national cooperative framework’ is not without merit

- Anilesh S. Mahajan and Kiran D. Tare

On July 6, Prime Minister Narendra Modi surprised everyone by constituting a new ministry of cooperation, with a government press release stating that the new entity would help cooperatives across states progress (‘sahkar se samriddhi’) as a true people-based movement reaching the grassroots. In the cabinet reshuffle the next day, Union home minister Amit Shah was given charge of the new ministry. As expected, the move has raised hackles in the opposition, who fear that more than the wellbeing of the cooperatives, there may be a “sinister agenda” behind the move, as CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury put it.

But even as the wheels started turning, the new ministry’s offices were being set up and there was talk of a new ‘national cooperative framework’, the Supreme Court stepped in to apply the brakes. On July 20, the apex court was categorical in stating that the Centre has legislative power with respect to only multi-state cooperative societies (those not confined to just one state). It also made it clear that states have exclusive power to legislate on topics reserved for them. This is extremely significant, as cooperation is a state subject. Thus, the SC upheld an eight-year-old Gujarat High Court verdict limiting the Centre’s say in the cooperative sector. Incidentally, it was Prime Minister Narendra Modi, as then chief minister of Gujarat, who had in 2013 challenged certain provisions of the 97th constitutional amendment that empowered the Centre to design a framework for the cooperative sector.