Disti Summit 09 : A Starting Ground For Confed India

Acall to build a national association, an idea to go back to the basics and a
discussion about handling vendors-these and more were some of the highlights of
the second edition of the high octane The DQ Week Disti Summit which wrapped up
recently. The serene surrounding of luxurious Vedic Village witnessed hectic
activities as around 100 top sub and regional distributors from across the
country congregated to meet and discuss the issues that bind the community
together. The summit was sponsored by MicroWorld, BPE and Leviton.

While the three-day summit had many invigorating sessions, the most debated
and participated one was the one taken by S Karthikeyan, Founder President,
Confed-ITA, the umbrella body for all IT associations in Tamil Nadu. The idea of
the session was to discuss the service tax that the government has levied on the
back-end incentives.

Adding a new dimension to the debate, Alok Gupta of Softmart Solutions, Delhi
said, “Logically the vendors are supposed to bear the service tax that is levied
on any transaction done for them by a third party. So all the sub distributor or
channel partner needs to do is raise an additional invoice about the additional
service tax now and send it to the vendor and they should reimburse you.”

Raising a valid point Sanjiv Bhavnani, who was one of the speakers at the
summit said, “One thing that all of you need to understand is that this will
only happen if the channel partner or, in context of this discussion, the sub
distributor has raised an invoice for the sale initially. If that has not
happened, then that will complicate things further.”

The subsequent mention of the court case that ISODA is fighting in Chennai
against the double taxation on software dealers caused more discussion. And it
was at this point that Gupta of Softmart mooted the idea of the present
delegates getting together and forming at least a group to start a national
movement for fighting for the rights of the channel partner community. He urged
that like the software dealers have formed a national association, the group
that is formed today should ask their partners and friends in the community to
join in and move towards forming a national body.

Gupta also suggested that The DQ Week, being the voice of the channel, play a
proactive role in the formation of the group. Seconding his move Karthikeyan
said, “It was about time that all dealers across the country got together under
one umbrella. I would request The DQ Week to help us in organizing a meeting of
all the associations in India so that we can take the next step in forming the
national association.” He urged the present delegates to go back to their
respective cities and associations, and join in.

Unanimously moving the resolution, PK Sinha of Astric Computers, Patna and
Vivek Singhania of Computers India Ranchi urged the gathering for immediate
formation of a group.

The Disti Summit ended with the formation of a group called Confed India
which would have as its members anyone who wants to join in and wants to have a
say in the channel conditions and fight for the rights of the channel partners.

While the partners in the last session called for a change and bonding
together, the seeds for the change were sown in the keynote session on day-one.

The highlight of day-two, apart from the Confed session, was the one that VK
Bhandari, MD, Supertron took. In his session Bhandari talked about his personal
experience and helped the present delegates look at the journey that they will
encounter while trying to evolve from a sub-distributor to a more national role.

The second edition of the Disti Summit also saw the institution of national
awards for the sub-distributor segment.

Shivangi Yadav

shivangiy@cybermedia.co.in