Government to announce Cooperative University in upcoming budget: Amit Shah

Union Home Minister and Minister of Cooperation Amit Shah on Friday inaugurated the celebrations for the International Year of Cooperatives 2025 in Mumbai. He also inaugurated the corporate office of the National Urban Cooperative Finance and Development Corporation (NUCFDC) and flagged off the first training session for 10,000 new Multipurpose Primary Agricultural Cooperative Societies (MPACS) members.

Amit Shah also revealed that in the upcoming budget session, the government will announce the establishment of the Tribhuvan National Cooperative University, named after the eminent cooperative leader of Gujarat, Tribhuvan Das Patel. This university will focus on producing skilled professionals for various sectors. He expressed confidence that, under Prime Minister Modi's leadership, the cooperative sector will drive employment and prosperity in agriculture, rural areas, and among the youth in the coming days.

Shah outlined a year-long program to celebrate the International Year of Cooperatives, aiming to expand the sector, enhance transparency, and strengthen cooperative institutions. He emphasized the need to integrate more people into cooperative initiatives and ensure that cooperatives play a key role in India’s journey toward becoming the world’s third-largest economic power and a fully developed nation by 2047. He said that India will celebrate the Year of Cooperatives in a way that will significantly advance the cooperative movement across the country.

Amit Shah also highlighted that the umbrella organization for cooperative banks, the National Urban Cooperative Finance and Development Corporation (NUCFDC), will provide multidimensional benefits to the urban cooperative sector. He added that within the next three years, all scheduled cooperative banks will be equipped with services equivalent to those offered by national and private banks. India currently has 1,465 urban cooperative banks, nearly half of which are in Gujarat and Maharashtra, along with 49 scheduled banks and over 8.25 lakh cooperative institutions.

Shah acknowledged the Modi government's efforts in addressing urban cooperative banks' concerns with the Reserve Bank of India. He stressed that strengthening the umbrella organization for cooperative banks would enhance trust and remove operational obstacles. He also highlighted the training initiative for 10,000 newly formed MPACS members as a crucial step in empowering rural cooperatives, with a long-term goal of establishing a PACS in every village panchayat.

He further stated that the Modi government is committed to advancing the cooperative sector and has introduced a ranking system to achieve this goal. The rankings will cover seven key areas: PACS, dairy, fisheries, urban cooperative banks, housing credit societies, credit cooperatives, and Khadi Village Industries. The ranking system is based on several parameters and aims to enhance transparency and reliability, ensuring that banks can confidently provide funding to PACS based on these rankings in the future.

On this occasion, Minister of State for Cooperation Murlidhar Mohol, Maharashtra Deputy Chief Ministers Eknath Shinde and Ajit Pawar, along with the Secretary of the Ministry of Cooperation, Dr. Ashish Kumar Bhutani, and several other dignitaries were present.