India Enables Inclusive Prosperity through Cooperation

The Indian government will soon launch Sahkar Taxi, a cooperative-run transport service for bike, cab, and auto rides.

Sahkar Taxi will offer an alternative to proprietary platforms like Ola and Uber.

Rooted in a cooperative model, Sahkar Taxi will empower taxi drivers to directly profit from their services without having to pay intermediaries.

Sahkar Taxi is part of the Indian government’s largest vision called Sahkar Se Samriddhi (Prosperity through Cooperation).

Sahkar Se Samriddhi aims to build more cooperatives across India — and make existing cooperatives self-reliant and prosperous.

In 2024, the ICA Global Cooperative Conference took place for the first time in New Delhi, and was inaugurated by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Indian Union home minister Amit Shah wrote an op-ed in The Times of India arguing “Cooperation guarantees Prosperity”.

The public policy think-tank NITI Aayog also touts “cooperative federalism” as a win-win governance model that creates synergies between the central government and state governments.

In my new book The Frugal Economy, I explain how to shift our current economic mindset rooted in competition to a new cooperative mindset that would enable prosperity to be created and shared collectively.

I believe India can become Viksit Bharat (Developed India) by building a virtuous economy based on what I call the 3 Dharmic Principles:

- Cooperation (businesses sharing resources)

- Distribution (decentralization of production and value creation)

- Regeneration (of people, communities, natural ecosystems)

I am glad to see the Indian government fully supporting the principle of Cooperation and seeing it as a pathway to inclusive prosperity.

I would like to see the Indian government also endorsing and enabling the two other principles of a Frugal Economy — namely distribution and regeneration.