Mumbai: Housing societies await new, 'improved' cooperative act

With the new state government finally up and working it is likely to announce the new cooperative act in a couple of weeks The act governs the functioning of statewide housing societies CHS which were barred from holding elections till December 31 Housing activists claimed that the new act is likely to include the many suggestions sent to the state cooperative departmentA senior Mantralaya official of the cooperative department told midday that over a hundred suggestions and objections have been received regarding the cooperative act ldquobut the entire department is working on the farmersrsquo loan waiver on top priorityrdquo He said ldquoThe housing election rules matter is yet to be finalised and work on it is under process It will gain momentum only once the farmers loan waiver concludesMost of the suggestions the official said are regarding continuing the old practice of letting housing societies with less than 250 members conduct their own elections We will be putting forward all the suggestions before the committee formed to frame the new rules The committees final decision will be put before the Cabinet Minister for Cooperation Balasaheb Patil and also the Law and Judiciary department before it is made public which should take another fortnight to a month he addedCommitteersquos amendmentsSources in the Cooperation Department told midday that the core committee making the decision comprises seven officials five from cooperative department and two from the federation of societies and is headed by Sandeep Deshmukh additional registrar cooperative society presently working in SRA The committee has prepared the draft rules for the new housing chapter under the MCS act We have also made a few amendments to the MCS Act Having members from the reserved category in the housing committee is recommended the minimum number of people for conducting elections has been brought down a concept of cooperative housing association is being introduced to facilitate the formation of an association of less than five societies for conveyance matters a concept of new members like joint and provisional members is introduced a penalty of R25000 on the management committee is introduced for not allowing inspection of society documents by a member said the officerResidentsrsquo suggestionsAmongst the ones who have submitted suggestions to the draft is Ramesh Prabhu chairman of MahaSeWA Maharashtra Societies Welfare Association We have sent our feedback in writing to Abha Shukla principal secretary Cooperation Department wherein we have objected to some of the points stated in the amended rules A secret ballot for housing society elections and a 15day period for the election process are some of the suggestions maderdquo Prabhu told middayInitial proposals in draft rules and suggestions by MahaSeWA1 Proposed Voting may be conducted by a show of hands or by secret ballot if demanded by more than onefifth of the members present in the meetingSuggestion Voting should be done through secret ballot papers only as it helps maintain secrecy2 Proposed Returning Officer shall be appointed by the committee of the housing society having less than or up to 250 members from a panel of Returning Officers approved by SCEA State Cooperative Election Authority and maintained by Divisional Joint Registrar before 60 days of the expiry of the tenure of the existing committeeSuggestion Members who are not candidates in the election or proposedseconded candidature of any member should be permitted to become the Returning Officer There must be more clarity and simplicity in the appointment of Returning Officer3 Proposed No appeal for the omission of members from the voters list by the Returning OfficerSuggestion Appeal should be provided with the Deputy Registrar as per the Maharashtra Cooperative Societies Act 19604 Proposed The entire election program is done on the same day ndash inviting the candidate scrutiny of nomination rejection of nomination withdrawal of nomination and counting of votesSuggestion A period of 15 days be given in the Maharashtra Cooperative Societies Act and election program should be divided into different dates for different activitiesRs 25KProposed penalty on housing societies for not allowing inspection of society documents by a memberCatch up on all the latest Crime National International and Hatke news here Also download the new midday Android and iOS apps to get latest updates