Secretary, Co-operative Department, Yasha Mudgal, today chaired a meeting of senior officers of Co-operative and allied departments to review implementation of various employment generation schemes in Jammu and Kashmir.Registrar, Co-operative Societies, Shafqat Iqbal; Special Secretary Cooperatives, Rachna Sharma, Additional Registrar Jammu, Dr. Nirupa Rai besides Directors and other senior officers of Animal and Sheep Husbandry, Agriculture, Horticulture, Fisheries, NRLM, Health, Tourism and Industries departments attended the meeting while representative of Chief General Manager, NABARD and Kashmir based officers participated online.The meeting was held following instructions of Lieutenant Governor issued by him while chairing a meeting on employment generation held on 15th November, 2021 which was also attended by the Chief Secretary.
Secretary, while addressing the meeting, said that the Cooperative sector provides a platform to individuals and groups who work in unorganized sector to register themselves as Cooperative Society which gives them the status of a legal entity called body Corporate. She stressed that the individuals can be organized to form Cooperative Societies which can be benefitted under various schemes available with the departments.The participating Directors gave an account of the schemes available with their respective departments which focus on employment generation. They expressed willingness to collaborate with Cooperative Department and venture into organizing the individual beneficiaries into Cooperatives. It was informed that several schemes like dairy farming, fruit cultivation, agriculture, sheep and goat rearing, trout and other fish farming, mushroom cultivation, tourism, floriculture and connected programmes can be implemented through Cooperatives which shall act as a game changer for the educated unemployed youth.
Secretary asked for registration of FPOs under Cooperative Act as there are less regulatory requirements under the Cooperative Act as compared to Companies Act apart from lesser maintenance costs.It was informed that Nodal Officers shall be appointed at Divisional and District level who shall liaise with other departments so that hassle-free services are provided to the promoters in registering as a FPO Cooperative.Secretary emphasized for involving women and forming good number of women Cooperative Societies and FPOs. She said that awareness and training programmes shall be held to accelerate the process of achieving targets so that at least 500 Cooperatives and FPOs are registered in a year. She added that area specific activities can be taken up for formation of Cooperatives which shall be beneficial for the members. She asked for synchronized working of the Cooperative department with other departments so that the problem of unemployment can be tackled to a considerable extent under Cooperative Sector.