DÜSSELDORF, GERMANY — The leader of the PlastIndia Foundation, the country's largest polymers trade association, has unexpectedly resigned, following back and forth within the group about moving the country's national plastics show, also called PlastIndia, and communication differences within the group's board.
Officials with the Mumbai-based PlastIndia Foundation said in interviews at K 2013 that President Bipin Shah resigned in early October. He has been replaced by Subhash Kadakia, who is also managing director of resin compounding firm Kadakia Plastics & Chemicals Pvt. Ltd.
Shah had led the group in deciding earlier this year to move the next edition of the large PlastIndia show in 2015 from New Delhi to an exhibition grounds still under construction in the state of Gujarat in western India.
What makes Shah's decision to resign unusual is that typically foundation presidents serve a three-year term between editions of the show.
Shah, who is also an executive at Mumbai-based Trend PlastPouchPack Pvt. Ltd., took over after 2012 show, and by tradition would have served until the next PlastIndia Fair, in February 2015, foundation officials said. One source said it's the first time the group has switched presidents between fairs.
In an Oct. 16 interview, Kadakia said he also supports moving the 2015 show to Gujarat, but acknowledged that not everyone in the organization did, and he said there were differences between Shah and the Foundation board.
“I personally feel that Bipin Shah did a wonderful job as our president but he failed in communicating with his managing committee people what he was doing and why he was doing it and how he wants to do it,” Kadakia said. “Probably that was the one thing that did not gel well.”
The PlastIndia Foundation is run by a managing committee composed of seven other Indian plastics trade associations, with the president chosen from among leaders of those groups.
There were “different ideas about where to move, how to move, why to move. There are many things in the minds of people of the managing committee,” he said.
Kadakia said the show had to move from the Pragati Maidan fairgrounds in Delhi because the 30-year-old complex was outdated and lacked enough electric power for the industrial show. But there had been doubts within Foundation members about whether the new hall could be ready in time.
He said the group is now fully behind moving the show to Gujarat, and he told a reception of more than 100 Indian executives at the K fair in Germany that the new exhibition facility has the strong support of the government of Gujarat and would be an improvement over Pragati Maidan.
“Gujarat is the most dynamic state where movement of things is done at very great speed,” he told the group. “2015 will be a great show.”
In the interview with Plastics News, Kadakian said that all seven member trade associations of the Foundation “are now in support” of moving the show.
“They were not well-informed and there were a lot of ifs and buts and doubts,” he said. “Basically it was the emotional tone of the people working with him, which, as I told you was not synchronized.”
Shah and Kadakian are both past presidents of the Indian Plastics Institute, one of the seven associations that manage PlastIndia Foundation.