Where are the associations?

Except G-10, rest all are pretty close to history

A significant player in IT market Chennai has four associations. And all four
claim to be working in the interest of resellers and trading community.

However, these associations, represented by its members, have failed to meet
regularly and it has been several months since they have discussed any issue of
common interest. Be it Information Technology Traders Association (ITTA), G-10
Computer Dealers Associa-tion, Sneham or Chennai Inkjet & Toner Refillers
Association (CITRA) the story remains the same.

In Chennai, DAIT (Dealers Association for Information Technology) was
supposed to be the first regional association for dealer community started as
early as 1993. In fact, DAIT was formed when the resellers decided to break away
from CMDA, the Mumbai-based association with its Tamil Nadu chapter in Chennai.
However, DAIT lost its steam within six years. Post 2000 period saw many new
associations come into existence.

"Vested interest is the rea-son for disunity and misun-derstanding
amongst the channel partners.

There is no consensus on anything here," lamented Nimish Tolia,
President of DAIT. While the industry believes DAIT is non-existent, he claims
otherwise. "DAIT has not been closed, it is inactive. Its bank account is
operational." For the record, DAIT met last in 2001 for an informal
gathering in a city hotel.

Similarly, ITTA, Sneham and CITRA are in the silent mode. ITTA, which formed
an election committee about four months back is yet to move ahead on that front.
This association was formed in 1998, got registered in 2001 and is awaiting
formal election for quite sometime now. Its first set of represen-tatives,
nominated in 2001, still hold office and the association hardly meets.
"People think of the association only when there is an issue and after
that, they forget it," pointed out MC Jain, Secretary of ITTA.

"There is no unity and discipline amongst the mem-bers. In fact, vendors
want this situation to continue so that they can rule over the channel
community. The channel community lacks commit-ment," added Sajan Kankaria,
Joint Secretary of ITTA.

"I think instead of key resellers the association should have many
elderly members (fathers of resellers) who can find time to work for common
cause. Also, channel business is pressure-oriented and rese-llers are finding it
hard to take out time to attend meetings," commented a key reseller in the
Ritchie Street market.

Sneham, an association for system integrators formed last year had its last
meeting a year back during the'credit policy' issue started by the
distri-butors. "We had planned to meet every month, but some-how it is not
happening as our businesses take all our time. We are also supposed to go for an
election this month," disclosed Sadiq Batcha, a key member of the
association.

Added B Krishna Kumar, VP of Sneham, "Association should not be a place
to meet only when there is an issue. We have to have a strong association to
represent all our issues. It is for us to devote time for both busi-ness and
association. Sneham will be revived soon and we are going to conduct formal
elec-tions within a couple of months."

"Commitment is important. People have little respect for time when it
comes to asso-ciation meeting," said R Kumar, Treasurer of Sneham. "We
have just got registered and soon we will launch a major drive to acquire new
members. Sneham will be a very active association soon," said Sridharan,
Secretary of Sneham. Meanwhile, CITRA can safely be considered as non-existent
as it has been a few years since it formally met.

G-10, a body that represents consumables resellers and has over 150 members
across Tamil Nadu, is the only asso-ciation where some action is happening. The
association had its last monthly meeting in April. "All the key members
have been traveling and busy with work, so we could not meet. But, in general,
G-10 is very committed. In fact, I pre-sume G-10 is the only asso-ciation which
collects a fine of Rs 100 for absence and late-entry to meetings," pointed
out Naresh Kanted, Joint Secretary, G-10 Computer Dealers Association.

"However, we have been able to achieve only 50 to 60 percent of the
objectives we had set. That needs to cha-nge," added Jithender Tatia,
President of G-10. He feels there should be more unity among members while boy-cotting
a vendor/supplier for a specific reason. Similarly information sharing on
defa-ulters should happen faster to benefit all.

S Gopikrishna

Chennai