Cooperators connected with Bihar’s District Central Cooperative Banks (DCCBs) have strongly condemned the state government move for merger of DCCBs with State Cooperative Bank and warned that they would be protesting against the government.
The cooperative leaders were reacting to the government officials seriously looking into the RBI guidelines issued recently in this connection.
In his reaction, Gopalganj DCCB Chairman Mahesh Rai said, the move is not in the interest of DCCBs and we are against this. Merger of DCCBs with StCBs will destroy the three-tier structure and ultimately with this farmers will suffer a lot because of lack of monitoring.
Vaishali DCCB Chairman Bisundeo Roy said, this is against an undemocratic move. We will launch agitation in the coming days if the government will not withdraw the move. We are working at the grassroots level and working in the interest of farmers.
Muzaffarpur DCCB Chairman Amar Pandey said, “Cooperative leaders connected with DCCBs are against the move. Bihar State Cooperative Bank is mired in controversy and there have been financial irregularities found in its three branches. The govt. should know that DCCB’s are connected to remote areas and doing a commendable job.
Nalanda DCCB former Chairman and MLA Jitendra Kumar said, as a cooperator we are against the move and this step will abolish the three-tier structure.
There are 22 District Central Cooperative Banks and they have 296 branches across the state. DCCBs have an NPA of over 24 percent and deposits of Rs 3200 crore. The credit and deposit ratio (CD ratio) of these banks is around 80 per cent.
An official associated with a bank said local politics dominates all district cooperative banks as politicians are selected as chairmen of banks and their colleagues are on the board.
Bandana Preyashi, Secretary, Cooperative Department, said that the decision of merging the district central cooperative banks with the State Cooperative Bank will be at the government level.
Currently the RBI guidelines are being studied. After this, the merger draft will be prepared on the instructions of the government and it will be implemented with the approval of the cabinet.
