PROVISION OP BORROWING FACILITIES. 431 



soon exploded. It was then said by some that the Provinces were 

 not ripe for the co-operative movement. It was urged that until 

 the spread of education became far more general it was vain to 

 imagine that co-operative societies could succeed. But others of us 

 held different views; and we determined to push on as best we could. 



Credit societies have money dealings, and where there are money 

 dealings accurate accounts are indispensable. Certain organizers, there- 

 fore, formed their societies round the Secretary. And the result was 

 that as tolerably efficient Secretaries were few and far between, co- 

 operative credit societies came into existence which included in 

 membership individuals from many villages scattered over extremely 

 large areas. Now that co-operative principles are better understood 

 I need not explain why mutual societies on these lines proved quite un- 

 workable. In 1907, however, thanks to some very valuable advice 

 from SIR J. O. MILLER, we first commenced (in the Jubbulpore District) 

 to form Raiffeisen societies, without share capital and with unlimited 

 liability and indivisible reserve funds. It was generally expected that 

 the movement would make very slow progress, that it would be long 

 before it could establish itself in the money market, and that Govern- 

 ment would, perforce, have to finance the societies. But MR. WOLFF 

 urged that Government money was poison to self-help ; and what MR. 

 WOLFF has to say is always well worth listening to. So we decided to 

 try and do without Government money and at once we had a fresh 

 problem to solve. In order to finance, organize, guide, and control our 

 societies we started " Central Banks." Writing in 1907, in " The 

 Agricultural Journal of India* I said, " Nobody pretends that a 

 Central Bank with capital subscribed by the leading men of the tahsil, 

 managed on purely business principles, and existing solely for the 

 purpose of lending money to rural societies, is itself a Co-operative 

 Credit Society in any sense of the term. Yet it exists for the purpose 

 of associating the best business talent available with the co-operative 

 credit movement, and is intimately connected with the scheme for 

 financing and testing the merits of rural societies. The Central Bank 

 should, then, be registered under the Act. Shareholders in the Central 

 Bank an, of course, reside anywhere, but the committee should be 

 chosen from shareholders resident within thetahsil. What is wanted is 

 a committee with good local knowlege of all parts of the tahsil. It will 



* " Co-operative Credit and the Central Bank," Volume II, Part I, January, 11)07. 



