Strengthening of Marketing Cooperative Societies

What is Strengthening of Marketing Cooperative Societies?

Strengthening of Marketing Cooperative Societies is a scheme of the Cooperation Department (Sahakarita Vibhag), Government of Chhattisgarh. According to the department's official scheme page at coop.cg.gov.in, the scheme provides financial assistance to marketing societies to start new businesses using their available land, and was launched on 1 April 2014.

The department publishes the funding pattern as a fixed three-way split of the approved project:

That structure is the whole design of the scheme, and it is worth reading carefully before a society applies. Only one-tenth of the assistance is free money. Half of it is a commercial loan at 10 per cent, and another two-fifths makes the State Government a shareholder in the society. Strengthening of Marketing Cooperative Societies is therefore closer to a state-backed business finance package than to a subsidy.

Why does Chhattisgarh fund marketing cooperatives this way?

Chhattisgarh's cooperative sector is dominated by credit. The Cooperation Department describes the state's 2,058 Primary Agricultural Credit Cooperative Societies and LAMPS as the core of the structure, and confirms that the state provides interest-free short-term agricultural loans of up to Rs 5,00,000 through cooperative societies and banks.

Marketing societies sit at the other end of the same chain. Their job is to move what the farmer grows, procurement, grading, storage, sale. A marketing society that only handles a seasonal procurement window earns for two or three months and sits idle for the rest of the year, usually on land and buildings it already owns. The scheme's stated aim, to start a new business on available land, is aimed squarely at that idle capacity.

The department is pushing the same logic through the cooperative sector more broadly. Under the "Prosperity through Cooperation" programme, all 2,058 PACS in the state have adopted the model bye-laws that allow more than 25 lines of business including dairy, fisheries and warehousing; Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samriddhi Kendras have been set up in all 2,058 PACS; and 26 societies now run Pradhan Mantri Bharatiya Janaushadhi Kendras. Strengthening of Marketing Cooperative Societies is the marketing-society equivalent of that diversification push, and it predates it by nearly a decade.

Who is eligible, and who is not eligible?

Eligible:

• Registered marketing cooperative societies in Chhattisgarh, registered and functioning under the Chhattisgarh Cooperative Societies Act, 1960.
• Societies that own land on which the proposed new business can be set up. This is the condition the scheme is built around.
• Societies with current audited accounts and a functioning board capable of passing a valid resolution.
• Societies whose bye-laws permit the proposed line of business, or which amend them first.

Not eligible and cannot apply:

• Individual farmers, traders, commission agents and entrepreneurs. Strengthening of Marketing Cooperative Societies creates no personal benefit. There is no individual application form and no citizen portal registration. Anyone told otherwise is being misled.
• Private companies, partnership firms and self-help groups, which are not cooperative societies registered under the 1960 Act.
• Societies without land of their own. The assistance is explicitly for using available land; a society renting premises has no base for the proposal.
• Non-functional, dormant or liquidated societies.
• Societies unable to service the 50 per cent loan at 10 per cent interest. The department assesses this from the audited accounts, and a society with weak finances will not clear scrutiny.

What documents does a society need?

How to apply for assistance under the scheme

The route is institutional and offline. There is no online form.

1. Confirm the society's land position. Obtain the land record showing the plot in the society's own name, free of dispute. Without this, the proposal cannot start.
2. Decide the business and check the bye-laws. If the proposed activity is outside the society's registered objects, take up a bye-law amendment with the Registrar first.
3. Pass a board resolution approving the project, accepting the 50 per cent loan at 10 per cent interest and the 40 per cent state share capital, and authorising an office bearer to sign the application.
4. Prepare a detailed project report with a realistic cost estimate, revenue projection and repayment schedule for the loan component, and attach the latest audited accounts.
5. Submit the proposal to the District Deputy Registrar of Cooperative Societies in the society's district, and obtain the file reference.
6. Follow the case to the Commissioner and Registrar's office, Raipur, which issues the sanction fixing the loan, share capital and grant amounts.
7. Execute the loan documents and receive the release, then start the work and keep separate accounts for the scheme funds, since they will be audited.

How to check the status of a proposal

1. Ask the District Deputy Registrar of Cooperative Societies for the file reference number and the current stage of the proposal.
2. Ask for the sanction order once issued. It records the approved project cost and the exact rupee amounts under each of the three components.
3. Track release of each instalment against the physical progress of the project; delayed releases are the usual cause of stalled work.
4. Escalate to the Office of the Commissioner, Cooperation and Registrar of Cooperative Societies, Raipur on 0771-2511920.

Why proposals fail

• Land not in the society's name. Land held by a member, on Gram Panchayat land without transfer, or under dispute will stop the case immediately.
• Statutory audit in arrears. The Cooperation Department audits societies under the 1960 Act, and a society with pending audits will not clear scrutiny.
• Weak project report. A proposal with no realistic revenue projection cannot support a repayable loan at 10 per cent interest.
• Activity outside the bye-laws, which makes the project legally impossible for the society to undertake.
• No elected board in existence. Where a society's board is not in place, the department makes arrangements for its functioning, and the proposal must be routed through that arrangement.
• Society unwilling to take on the loan component. Some societies apply expecting a grant and withdraw when the 50:40:10 structure is explained.

Where to raise a grievance

• District Deputy Registrar / Assistant Registrar of Cooperative Societies in the society's district, the first level for any proposal or release dispute.
• Office of the Commissioner, Cooperation and Registrar of Cooperative Societies, Raipur to 0771-2511920; Additional Commissioner 0771-2511923.
• Chhattisgarh State Cooperative Bank (Apex Bank), Raipur — general helpline 0771-2539690 to where the banking tier is involved.
• The Cooperation Department also functions as a civil court under the Chhattisgarh Cooperative Societies Act, 1960, resolving disputes among members, office bearers, officers and employees of societies, and passing orders at both trial and appellate level.

Related institutional support for cooperative societies

A marketing society weighing this scheme should look at it alongside two others run by the same department. Share Capital for Cooperative Societies allows the State Government to invest in the share capital of State Cooperative Banks, DCCBs, PACS, sugar factories and marketing societies specifically to raise their borrowing capacity. Upgradation of PACS to Multi-Purpose Cooperative Societies offers a grant of Rs 10 lakh for projects of up to Rs 25 lakh, once per eligible society, for non-traditional business. The three schemes are different doors into the same objective, giving a cooperative society a second revenue line beyond the seasonal one it already has.