Public cooperative model need of the hour: RBI director Satish Marathe

Satish Marathe, the newly- appointed director on the board of the Reserve Bank, has called for adopting a public co-operative model in the place of the public private partnerships model to ensure a balanced development and growth.

Marathe, the founder of the Sahakar Bharati, a non- political and non-government organisation working towards strengthening the co-operative movement, was recently appointed as a director on the board of the central bank.

Noting that the public private partnership model adopted after the 1991 liberalisation has not brought about the desired development impact nor diminished the role of the co-operative movement, he said, "the nation is in need of a public co-operative model to ensure that development is balanced and effective".


Marathe further said, "if we are to achieve long-term balanced and effective development, we need to have a public co-operative model and not public private partnership model" and pointed out that many countries have adopted the public cooperative movement for development with good success.

"If the co-operative sector has been contributing to many other sectors especially in terms of employment generation, it is fair that the sector gets its due from a strategic planning point of view," he said while addressing a facilitation function.

He also called for changing the century-old laws dealing with the cooperative sector and urged the Reserve Bank to prepare a new vision document for the sector. He also wants the government to amend the Banking Regulation Act so that urban cooperative banks come under its purview.

Similarly, the Niti Aayog should give priority to the co-operative sector in the its policies, he said.