December 3, 2025
Rajya Sabha MP Saket Gokhale’s supplementary questions on the need for the government to publish an ethical code of conduct for NCEL and the reason the 11,500 state cooperatives are not represented on the board of NCEL
Sir, I have a point of order. Sir, I should be allowed to raise the point of order. Mr. Chairman, Sir, in the answer given by the hon. Minister to this question, they have disclosed that NCEL has had related party transactions of Rs. 2,673 crore. That is a huge number. What are the related party transactions? Related party transactions are the ones where someone, who is on the Governing Board, also indulges in financial transactions with the company that they themselves own or head. Here, they are saying that this amount of Rs. 2,673 crore of related party transactions has been for procurement of commodities. NCEL has a sixMember Board, of which one seat is vacant. The remaining five seats consist of directors who belong to large agricultural cooperatives in the country. Now, these same cooperatives are also suppliers to NCEL.The question, which I had originally asked as well and which has not been answered, is this. On the website of NCEL there is absolutely no disclosure of any related party, transaction code or any conflict of interest code. So, my question is: “Will the Ministry bring in more transparency by publishing a code of conduct and an ethical conduct code for NCEL to avoid conflict of interest?” Sir, I had clearly asked about related party transactions. Is there a code of conduct? I am sure the Minister either did not understand or was not prepared, but that is okay. My second supplementary question again relates to NCEL. I would again like a very specific answer and not about background because I am aware of the background. There is a six-member voting board at the NCEL of which one is a Government entity and one of NAFED is vacant right now. So, right now, there are about four active members on that. I would love to inform the hon. Minister himself that there is actually 11,500 — not 1,000 something — State cooperatives that come under the NCEL. Today, the NCEL is being positioned as a mandatory hub for exports. Now, there are 11,500 State level cooperatives. None of these cooperatives have a seat on the board of NCEL. As I said in my earlier question as well, they are all controlled by the large agricultural cooperatives, the State level ones do not have. Cooperatives is the name of the Ministry. So, cooperatives also means cooperative federalism. My question pertains to federalism. This Government talks about cooperative federalism but has an issue when it comes to implementing it. Just to give you an example from my State, my State owes over Rs.2,00,000 crores at the MGNREGA, AWAS and other schemes. They have been depriving the people of Bengal of our funds… My question, very specifically, is this. Will the hon. Minister… Will the hon. Minister kindly explain why 11,500 State co-operatives are not represented on the Board of NCEL? Will the Ministry take any steps to make it into a cooperative federal structure by including someone from the State co-operatives on the Board of NCEL? Thank you, Sir.
