CMDA plans its own facility

Delhi-based Computer Media Dealers Association (CMDA) is envisaging to have its own facility where all the media related dealers would be based under one roof. "A facility like this makes sense and it will actually help us grow at a faster rate as the interaction within the reseller community will be elevated and it will be easier for our customers also to find all the shops at a single place," pointed out Puneet Singhal, President,
CMDA.

The association is moving forward with a two-pronged approach--initially it is looking to have its own office premises. "First we want to have a small facility for the association and after that our goal is to base all the media related resellers at a single facility, just like Nehru Place. We should learn from countries like Singapore, where even the consumable dealers have their separate facility. In this regard, we have already requested for land to the Union IT and Communications Minister Arun Shourie. Though we are yet to get his response, but I am sure that something positive will come up pretty soon," he hoped.

The 150 strong member association has published its first member directory containing information about all its members and the executive committee. The association was formed with an aim to have a platform specifically for media and consumables trade to address the problems being faced by them. "Though we had different associations, but most of them were concentrating towards the hardware part. We never had any platform to share our grievances because all the associations were dominated by hardware dealers, so we thought about creating our own association," explained
Singhal.

The association is also planning to have its website, where all the information about its activities and members will be placed over the web. "We are planning to have a website by the end of this year. This website will have an online shopping cart and a dealer network as well. These initiatives are aimed at increasing the interactivity within ourselves as well as with our customers," he revealed.

In its bid to address the rise in number of default cases, the association has appointed a special committee. "Within the association there was this rampant trade defaulting issue and to address that we have appointed a committee under AK Pandey of Miraj. Disputes of large amounts between members of the association were amicably sorted out and certain issues of criminal nature were also handled successfully by this committee. The scope of this committee has also stretched to helping out innocent members being harassed by way of raids by various enforcement agencies," said Singhal

Zia Askari