SITA elects new office-bearers for 2003-04

South Gujarat Information and Technology Association (SITA) announced its new committee and unveiled its new code of conduct for its members in its AGM held on July 5. Paresh Bookseller is the new president of SITA. The rest of the committee includes Hiten Shah as Vice President, Bharat Gandil as Honorary Secretary, Kaushal Chokshi as Joint Secretary, Chetan Desai as Joint Secretary, Jwalant Shroff as Treasurer, and Bhavesh Tailor as Joint Treasurer.

The outgoing President Deepak Shethwala also unveiled the achievements of SITA for the year 2002. "In terms of achievements, SITA was able to convince vendors like Microsoft and HP to stop pressurizing the channel to sell high volumes and to conduct more amount of promotional schemes. We were also able to assist the newly formed association ABITA (Ankleshwar and Bharuch Information Technology Association) to set up its initial activities."

He added, "And in terms of profits SITA has been able to make Rs 7 lakh and above from its annual PC Expo. The net income the association has been able to make is approximately Rs 3
lakh."

At the AGM, the new President also announced his new plans, "This year at SITA there will be programs conducted for the upliftment of the members. Instead of being just a PC Expo association, SITA wants to provide its members knowledge so that they can enhance their business. The channel must look at getting into value-added services, facilities management and BPO. There are a lot of leading organizations looking at India to set up call centers, back office set-ups and CRM solutions. Improving of payment cycle from the end-user which will even help out the channel partner."

He added, "Money saving schemes must be taught to the channel so that they can control their overheads and also increase efficiency. Improve relationship with vendors, increase knowledge on VAT and other tax reforms, encourage local educational institutes to introduce skilled manpower for the industry, work towards forming a national association and conducting PC Expo 2004."

At the AGM the association also unveiled its code of conduct. This was already planned by SITA to introduce the code of conduct in the third week of June. This code of conduct was formed by a special committee consisting of four members--Deepak Shethwala (Past President), Brijesh Khanna (Past President), Chetan Shah, and Kamlesh
Yagnik.

The code of conduct will be distributed amongst all the members of the association. It would mainly contain general moral imperatives, specific professional responsibilities, organizational leadership imperatives and finally compliance with the code.

Nancy Sudheer