Kaushik Pandya appointed as FITAG President

The newly formed Federation of IT Association Gujarat (FITAG) has announced
the names of its board members. Kaushik Pandya, President of Ahmedabad Computer
Merchant Association (ACMA) has been officially elected as the President of
FITAG while Ketan Patel, President of South Gujarat Information Technology
Association (SITA) will be VP. Yogesh Thakkar, President of Baroda Information
Technology Association (BITA) has been elected as FITAG's General Secretary and
Gaurang Vyas, President of Gandhinagar IT Association will shoulder the
responsibility of the Treasurer.

Pandya said, “FITAG is a statewide federation of the local associations in
Gujarat, which will address the problems facing each of these bodies in a
unified manner. Each and every IT association from the state will actively
participate in the development of the federation. We will organize regular
meetings to update our members about any new initiatives undertaken by FITAG.”

IT associations across Gujarat gathered on July 12 in Ahmedabad for a general
body meeting. They held a discussion on the setting up of FITAG and the
immediate activities it ought to undertake. It was decided that the each local
association would elect one member to represent it on FITAG's executive council.

According to the rules made by the federation, all associations in Gujarat
can be FITAG members. However, membership will not be given to individuals or a
single organization. FITAG would be headquartered in Ahmedabad, as it is a
commercial hub of Gujarat and initially all its activities will be carried from
the office premises of ACMA. The FITAG executive council will again meet up in
the second week of August to finalize the structure of the federation and
announce the roadmap for the year.

This is the third instance in the country when local associations in a state
have come together to form a federation. The other two, besides FITAG, are
Confederation of IT Associations (Confed-ITA) in Tamil Nadu and the UP Computer
Dealers Association (UPCDW). So is this trend of having a unified single body in
the state truly beneficial to the channel partners?

Yes, said S Karthikeyan, President of Confed ITA. “Our voice will be heard by
vendors and government agencies better when we can vocalize it on a stronger
platform. Our federation has nearly 1,000 partners as members. If we count 10
employees per partner, then 10,000 powerful voices will emerge. It will
definitely become easier to address our member's problems and unsolved issues
when we have the backing of so many people with us,” he shared.

Rohit Kohli, President of UPCDW agreed with Karthikeyan's viewpoint. He said,
“We are trying to solve every problem of dealers through our federation since
the past year and a half. Till date we have not faced any problems from
distributors and manufacturers, probably because we have the cumulative strength
of the entire state's channel with us.”