'Ideal time to revive cooperative sector'

Accusing the Congress of killing the Cooperatives movement and destroying the Cooperative societies during its long rule in the country, Union Minister of Cooperation, Amit Shah lauded Prime Minister Narendra Modi for establishing the first Ministry of Cooperation in 2021, 74 years after independence, and asserted that this is the golden time to revive the cooperative sector across the country.

- STATESMAN NEWS SERVICE

Shah was addressing the State-Level Cooperatives Convention organised under the ongoing 'International Cooperatives Year — 2025' at Ravindra Bhavan in Bhopal on Sunday afternoon.

"Over the years, the cooperative movement in the country was reeling at most places and it was almost taking its last breaths in some states," Shah lamented.

He pointed out that the main reason behind this sorry state of affairs was that there was no entity at the Centre to take steps for the progress of the cooperative sector, and also because the old cooperative laws had not been changed according to the changing needs of time.

"It was after 75 years of independence that PM Narendra Modi took the initiative and set up the country's first Cooperation Ministry," Shah noted.

"The first step we took was to draft model by-laws for all the Primary Agricultural Credit Societies (PACS) across the country," Shah informed.