Union Home Minister and Minister of Cooperation Amit Shah said that every panchayat will have a Primary Agricultural Credit Societies (PACS) and thus, in the next five years, three lakh Primary Agricultural Credit Societies (PACS) will be formed in the country. He was delivering his address at the prestigious Laxmanrao Inamdar Memorial lecture, organised by Mumbai University and Sahakar Bharati in Maharashtra, Yesterday. The Minister said, the role of PACS will be multi-dimensional and it can discharge functions of dairy, fishermen society, run a petrol pump, cooking gas agency and even cheap foodgrain and medical shops, he said. "We have made PACS viable by adding 20 more activities. Model bye-laws (related to PACS) were sent to the States'', he added. Twenty-three parties have accepted the model bye-laws irrespective of party politics," he added. Mr. Amit Shah said that if we take forward the activities of cooperatives by combining them with modern technology in tune with the changing times, then there is no better way to develop the economy along with employment generation in a country like India. He said that the government is going to take many new steps in the cooperative sector in the coming days. So do not assume that the cooperative has become irrelevant, rather the future of the cooperative is going to be brighter. Several dignitaries, including Governor of Maharashtra, Shri Ramesh Bais and Chief Minister, Shri Eknath Shinde, were present on the occasion.
In his address talking about Laxmanrao Inamdar, Amit Shah said that born in Maharashtra, Laxmanrao chose Gujarat as his Karmbhumi, where throughout his life, he remained a source of inspiration for the youth. He said Inamdar was the only person in the cooperative sector who was neither a member nor an office-bearer of any cooperative society but contributed significantly to the movement. Mr. Amit Shah gave examples of many reforming administrative decisions taken by Modi government. He said that for the first time after Independence, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has brought both cooperative and corporate at the same level in terms of income tax. He said.
Akashvani correspondent reports that Union Home Minister and Minister of Cooperation Amit Shah said that everyone remembers Shri Laxmanrao with utmost respect among the prominent national leaders of the cooperative sector. He said that among all these leaders, Shri Inamdar was the only one, who was neither a member nor an office bearer of any cooperative society, yet he contributed significantly to the cooperative sector. Shri Shah said that Shri Laxmanrao Inamdar possessed intellectual rigour when it came to the principles and essence of cooperation, and he used this to address and eradicate prevailing shortcomings within the cooperatives, Shri Shah said that Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi has created a separate Ministry of Cooperation in the country to give a new life and momentum to the cooperative sector.
