Report of the Committee on Co-operation in India 1915

Hence it is clear that the creditors' real security consists not in the material assets of the members but in the ability and desire of the members to put the borrowed money to productive uses and to repay the loan out of the profits made thereby. [...] Such a Union is a body of which the only members are the primary societies within a circle of a radius averaging generally about 8 miles and at the deliberations of which each member of the society has a number of votes proportionate to the number of its own members. [...] The duties of the Union are to advise on the grant of loans to its constituent societies and to supervise the working of these societies. [...] The effect of this would be to add three superior whole-time officers to the registering staff of the Punjab two to that of the United Provinces and the Central Provinces and one to each of the other provinces. [...] We have found that in many cases it has been the custom for an application by a society for a loan to be adjudicated on by the Registrar or one of his staff and for the work of the Central Bank to be limited to paying over the amount of the loan sanctioned if it had in hand the money to do this.