Ministry of Cooperation

India’s cooperative movement went more than 70 years after Independence without its own ministry. That changed in 2021. And the new ministry has moved fast: new laws, new national bodies, digital villages and even a cooperative taxi app.

1Chapter 1: How the Ministry Was Born

Must Know

Founding

• The Ministry of Cooperation was created on 6 July 2021.
• It was carved out of the Ministry of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare.
• Amit Shah became India’s first-ever Union Cooperation Minister.
• Its motto is “Sahkar se Samriddhi”. It means prosperity through cooperation.
• The aim is to deepen the cooperative movement down to the grassroots, not just at the state or national level.
• Giving cooperation its own ministry is a real structural shift, not a rebrand. It is the first dedicated Union-level home this sector has had since Independence.

The 2023 amendment

• The Multi-State Cooperative Societies (Amendment) Act, 2023 was enacted on 3 August 2023.
• It amends the parent MSCS Act of 2002. It is the first amendment to that Act.
• It rewrites how multi-state societies are governed, elected and audited.
• It sets up a Cooperative Election Authority to run fair and timely elections for society boards.
• Delayed or disputed internal elections had quietly hurt cooperative governance for decades. This targets that long-standing problem.
• It creates a Co-operative Ombudsman to hear member grievances.
• Every multi-state society must also appoint an Information Officer.

2Chapter 2: New Bodies, PACS and Tax Relief

Good to Know

Three new national bodies

• Each gives cooperative producers a dedicated national channel to sell through, rather than relying only on private trade.
• They sit alongside the older national federations.
• Tribhuvan Sahkari University is India’s first dedicated cooperative-education university. It is based at Anand, Gujarat.

What is happening to PACS?

• PACS are Primary Agricultural Credit Societies. They are the village-level base of the short-term credit system. See The Short-Term Cooperative Credit Structure: PACS, DCCBs and NABARD.
• A Centrally Sponsored Project from 2022-23 to 2026-27 is digitising them.
• All PACS move onto one common ERP system. It replaces scattered manual and local software records.
• PACS can now take up over 25 business activities beyond farm credit.
• Examples: running Common Service Centres, Jan Aushadhi medicine stores and fuel outlets.
• The bet: existing rural cooperative infrastructure can double as last-mile service delivery, not just farm credit.

Tax relief

• Cooperatives got real tax relief alongside the new ministry.
• The surcharge fell from 12% to 7%.
• Minimum Alternative Tax fell from 18.5% to 15%.

3Chapter 3: Governance and the Latest Numbers

Current Affairs

Stronger governance, 31 July 2026

• New rules under the MSCS (Amendment) Act took effect to protect depositor and member rights. (Source: PIB)
• A Co-operative Ombudsman handles member grievances. Every multi-state society must appoint an Information Officer.
• Audit oversight got tighter. There is concurrent audit, uniform accounting standards, and mandatory tabling of Apex societies’ audit reports in Parliament.
• Expelled members now face a 3-year exclusion, up from just 1 year.

The fifth anniversary push

• 29 Jun–6 Jul 2026: the Ministry ran a week-long campaign for its 5th anniversary and Foundation Day, held at Bharat Mandapam, New Delhi. (Source: PIB)
• Amit Shah marked the conversion of 50,000 PACS into e-PACS.
• He launched Sahakar CBS, a core banking platform, and Sahakar Sahyogi, a conversational AI tool. Both are for Urban Cooperative Banks.
• The event also covered 135 foodgrain godowns transferred, 85 dedicated and 47 with foundation stones laid. It launched NCD 3.0 and a geo-tagging mobile app.
• These are government statements. Exams usually ask about structure, not counts.

PACS computerisation and new societies

• By June 2026, 79,630 PACS had been sanctioned for computerisation. 63,428 societies were already using the ERP software. (Source: Organiser)
• The national project carries a Rs 2,925.39 crore outlay.
• A separate initiative, Meri Samiti Mera Patal, gives each PACS its own unique digital identity. It is live so far in Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, J&K, Delhi, Chandigarh and Leh-Ladakh.
• Since Feb 2023, 38,138 new PACS, dairy and fishery cooperatives have been registered nationally.
• These include 10,225 new Multipurpose PACS enrolling 27.79 lakh members. Rajasthan leads with 2,003.

Bharat Taxi

• Bharat Taxi, India’s first cooperative-led ride-hailing platform, launched on 5 February 2026. (Source: PIB)
• It is run by Sahakar Taxi Cooperative Limited (STCL), a multi-state cooperative society. It is funded entirely from its own capital, at zero cost to the government.
• Driver-members, called Sarathis, keep their full earnings under a zero-commission model.
• It has expanded to Delhi, Gujarat, Maharashtra and Rajasthan.
• By late July 2026 it had about 8 lakh registered Sarathis and 41 lakh customers.
• It runs roughly 11,000 trips a day. About ₹77 crore is credited directly to Sarathis’ accounts. See App-Based Services in India.

The national bodies, by the numbers

• NCEL had exported 15.4 lakh metric tonnes of produce, worth ₹6,295 crore, to 38 countries by June 2026. (Source: Organiser)
• By late July 2026, 17,105 societies had enrolled with NCEL, 14,550 with NCOL and 38,665 with BBSSL.
• BBSSL has released seeds for 18 crops in 124 varieties under its “Bharat Beej” brand. (Source: PIB)

The National Cooperative Database

• As of 15 July 2026, India had 8,53,430 cooperative societies. (Source: PIB)
• Of these, 6.63 lakh were functional, 1.41 lakh non-functional and 49,177 under liquidation.
• Of the functional ones, 3.56 lakh were profit-making and 2.50 lakh loss-making.
• Maharashtra has the most societies, at 2,27,177.
• The National Cooperation Policy, 2025 has 6 strategic pillars, 16 objectives and 83 recommendations.
• The Ministry has taken 152 initiatives to implement it. Its Policy Implementation and Monitoring Committee held its first meeting on 9 June 2026.

Tribhuvan University grows

• On 14 July 2026, Tribhuvan Sahkari University held its first Convocation at Anand, Gujarat. It conferred degrees on 302 graduates and 2 PhDs. (Source: PIB)
• By 2026-27, enrolment reached 350 students across four MBA programmes.
• Its network spans 16 affiliated institutions across 10 States and UTs.

Dairy: White Revolution 2.0

• The Ministry aims to set up 75,000 new Dairy Cooperative Societies and strengthen 46,422 existing ones. (Source: PIB)
• So far 24,097 new DCSs are formed and 31,394 existing ones strengthened.
• Two new multi-state dairy cooperatives, GSSL and CISDL, were set up to promote sustainability.

Jan Aushadhi and grain storage

• PACS running Jan Aushadhi Kendras get a one-time ₹2 lakh special grant. (Source: PIB)
• They also get a monthly-procurement incentive. Such stores can earn over ₹35,000 a year on average.
• 4,183 PACS have applied to run these stores. 4,169 got initial approval and 799 already have store codes.
• Under the World’s Largest Grain Storage Plan, 1,015 PACS are identified for godown construction. 313 are completed, for 1.80 lakh metric tonnes of capacity.

Jammu and Kashmir’s revival

• J&K’s cooperative sector has been revived under the Cooperative Ranking Framework, launched 24 January 2025. (Source: PIB)
• As of 15 July 2026, the UT had registered 1,611 new societies.
• These are 232 multipurpose PACS, 1,339 dairy cooperatives and 40 fisheries cooperatives.

Financing the movement

• NCDC had disbursed ₹5,74,090.48 crore for cooperative development as of 30 June 2026. ₹3,96,763 crore came in the last five years alone. (Source: PIB)
• The RBI removed the ₹50 crore minimum net-worth rule for Rural Cooperative Banks to become insurance Corporate Agents. That widens their ability to sell insurance.

REPCO Bank’s dividend

• On 5 August 2026, Amit Shah received a ₹22.90 crore dividend cheque from REPCO Bank. (Source: PIB)
• The bank posted a record ₹169 crore net profit for FY 2025-26 and crossed ₹26,000 crore in business mix.

4Chapter 4: The Exam Trap

Great to Know

• The Ministry is young. So exams still test the wider cooperative-banking ecosystem it oversees, not just its creation.
• A recurring trap: assuming state governments alone regulate cooperative banks. In practice, the RBI regulates their banking functions.
• Keep the administrative layer (Ministry of Cooperation, Registrar of Cooperative Societies) separate from the banking-regulation layer (RBI). Both touch the same institutions.
• The 2023 Act is an amendment, not a new Act.
• The Ministry does not regulate banking.
• See Urban Cooperative Banks in India: Regulation and Structure.
• Cooperatives also appear in the Directive Principles. See Directive Principles of State Policy (DPSP).

5Previous Year Questions

Exam angle: one real question on who regulates Urban Cooperative Banks.

Quick Q&A

• Ministry created? 6 July 2021.
• First minister? Amit Shah.
• Parent Act? MSCS Act, 2002.
• UCB regulator? The RBI.
• Motto? Sahkar se Samriddhi.