360 PROVISION OF BORROWING FACILITIES. 



Now it is curious that in the earliest societies of Madras (1852) 

 directors did give their services gratuitously ; the objects of the 

 Funds were declared to be "mutual benefit," and the most enlightened 

 and public spirited of the members undertook the promotion and 

 direction of these societies for the public good without reward save 

 that of their conscience. It is now made expressly an item of 

 complaint that a struggle for profits and stipends has replaced the old 

 philanthropic public-spirted sense of devotion that the emoluments 

 of directors have been, hitherto, steadily on the increase, while the 

 posts themselves have become the objects of scramble and intrigue, 

 votes being even purchased, it is said, from the ignorant mass of 

 members ; some assert that the class of directors is deteriorating as, 

 indeed, is probable if office is to be chaffered for. If it is argued 

 that men require pay for increased work, it is replied that by far the 

 most arduous work was done in founding and nursing the societies at 

 their start, not in the mere carrying on of a somewhat greater volume 

 of business that the later history of the Nidhis does not show a 

 better class of work than the older, while, in fact, the paid directors 

 have often shown the grossest negligence and incapacity. One large 

 and flourishing society, in fact, though already directed at very low 

 rates, has proposed to abolish directors' fees with the express intention 

 of stopping this divergence from the "mutual" path ; the proposal 

 has, however, not been carried ; another large society has reduced it 

 directors' fees by one-third. These facts indicate a growing perception 

 that the initiative idea of the societies has been departed from. It 

 may be useful here to point to Europe where, as in the Popular and 

 Savinge banks of Italy, especially, Milan, or as in the great Trustee 

 Savings banks and Friendly societies of England, or the Building 

 secieties of the United States, an enormous mass of high class work 

 is done without a thought of pecuniary reward by men of great 

 ability and of engrossing private business, who yet give freely of 

 their scanty leisure. 



Directors are responsible for all money belonging to the share 

 holders, but only occasionally is security demanded from them either 

 direct or in the shape of inalienable shares as is invariably the case in 

 Europe, where every director and permanent auditor (censeur) 

 must hold a number of paid-up shares, which are inalienable, are 

 specially marked in evidence of this, and are deposited in the company's 

 safe. Only the above-mentioned bank has such a rule in that, 



