Young blood usurps Bankura association

In a dramatic move yet again highlighting the ongoing rivalry between upcountry channel partners in West Bengal, the president of Bankura Computer Dealer's Welfare Association (BCDWA) was not only forced to resign from his post but also resigned from the association membership on whimsical grounds paving the way for "young blood" to take over the charge of the body.

It all began in mid-July with BCDWA suddenly calling for a general body meeting where the functional Executive Committee was dissolved forcing all the office bearers to quit followed by an unconvincing "election" of new office bearers.

The new body not only stopped with the new usurp but went ahead to boycott the former President and another former member of BCDWA asking all members of BCDWA to stop all dealings with them.

According to Rajesh Jajodia, past-president, BCDWA (now non member), some of the new generation members felt that BCDWA needed new direction and called for a sudden meeting asking its members to "close their shops" to attend the meeting justifying that members will not be able to concentrate on the meeting if their shops remained open. It seemed impractical for Jajodia to keep the "shop closed" and he voiced his opinion.

Further, in the meeting where the selection of the new office bearers were made, it was decided that members of BCDWA will not quote the individual components of an assembled computer to the customer and will instead quote the total pricing during trade enquiries. However, according to the new president of BCDWA, it is still in a stage of discussion but Jajodia has claimed the decision to be a final one.

"Several schemes affect the pricing of the computer parts and on account of this the price of the same component varies between dealers. Now the customer questions the difference of pricing and it creates much misunderstanding between the dealers and the buyer. Hence, we have proposed to go for uniform price quotations during sales enquiries but will give the entire details over pricing once the bill is raised", said Sandeep Dey, president, BCDWA.

However, the adoption of this practice is against the customer's legal rights to know the MRP which Jajodia has questioned.

"The customer has full legal right to know the price and nobody can deny him this. If I were to remain a member of BCDWA, I have to follow the dictate failing to which I will face different problems from the governing body. On the other hand, if I abide by their dictum and do not quote the price to the consumer, I will be doing an unethical and illegal thing. Hence, I decided to leave the association and wish the new body good luck", Jajodia said.

The move was also opposed by Nazimul Alam, another former member of BCDWA who also resigned from membership.

When The DQ Week questioned Dey about the consequences leading to the ‘election', Dey responded, "The former office bearers were burdened with their duties and wanted to leave their respective office; hence we opted to form a new body with members' consensus.

However, Jajodia claimed that he was quite happy with his former post and had an "emotional attachment with BCDWA for which he wished to continue with the association", but recent developments forced him to resign both his post as well as membership.

Going a step ahead, the new secretary of the association has circulated a mail to all members of BCDWA asking them "not to conduct any business with Jajodia and Alam as they are non members".

When The DQ Week questioned Dey over the mail, he clarified that although the mail has been sent from the secretary's desk, in the next meeting, they will deliberate over this step and then decide the future course of action.

The real motive behind the mail is however, is still left unanswered.

As the recent developments in Bankura has yet again put into question about the rivalry and jealousy among channel partners in the state, these developments will definitely lead to crippling the emerging market with both quirky and illegal course of actions to follow suit.