Mumbai: The Supreme Court has upheld a Bombay High Court ruling that bars anyone who has served as a director of a cooperative bank for 10 straight years from working in these banks or contesting their elections. At least 100-plus cooperative satraps in Maharashtra — sitting and former ministers and MLAs among them — are hit, and they will have to sit out the district central bank elections due next.
The Centre amended the Banking Regulation Act so that power in district central and urban cooperative banks does not concentrate in one place, monopolies are avoided and other eligible candidates get a fair chance. The provision disqualifies those who have been directors continuously for 10 years or more, and also stops them from contesting the next election. It has been in force since 2021, but in the past five years no one who broke the rule faced disqualification.
Cooperation minister Babasaheb Patil, Kolhapur DCCB chairman and medical education minister Hasan Mushrif, agriculture minister Dattatray Bharne, textiles minister Sanjay Savkare, MLA Dilip Walse Patil and BJP MLAs Pravin Darekar and Prasad Lad are among nearly 900-plus cooperative satraps who cannot contest the district bank polls this time. Many are now scrambling to field relatives and aides in their place.
Vidyadhar Anaskar, administrator of the State Cooperative Bank, doubts the law will change much. 'Those barred from contesting have simply pushed their relatives into the banks. So there is little chance of any change in these family-run outfits,' he said.