Election to the post of Vice-Chairman, AEPC (Apparel Export Promotion Council), which is to be held from March 23 to 25, seems to have become a cause for dissension within the industry.
Lalit Gulati (Modelama Exports, Gurgaon), an apparel industry veteran, and HKL Magu, Jyoti Apparels, Delhi (both Executive Committee Members) have submitted their offer to contest the election for the post. However, Puneet Kumar, IAS, Secretary General, AEPC has said that “in the best of my knowledge, these two candidates in fray for the post of Vice-Chairman, AEPC are disqualified to contest.”
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In his letter to Ashok G Rajani, Chairman, AEPC, Puneet Kumar have raised certain questions. He stated that HKL Magu continued as senior Vice-Chairman (Northern Region) till December 2013, while Lalit Gulati continued as Vice-Chairman (Eastern Region) till December 2015, that is to say, that both of them have been vice-chairmans of the AEPC in the recent past, and have not completed the minimum mandatory period of 4 years as required under Para 2.92(b) of the Handbook of Procedures, as contained in the Foreign Trade Policy (FTA) 2015-20, as on date of filing nomination in February 2016. Therefore, both the candidates in fray for contesting the post of Vice-Chairman, AEPC are disqualified to contest. The matter is also in the notice of MoT (Ministry of Textiles) and Ministry of Commerce as copy of this letter, written on March 4, is also marked to Rashmi Verma, Secretary Textiles and Rita Teaotia, Commerce Secretary, which has been seen by Apparel Resources.
The letter also stated that it is indeed very intriguing that each time it comes to taking decision relating to election to the post of Vice-Chairman since the announcement for Electronic Voting System (EVS), only an emergent executive committee meeting is called without observing the formalities of giving mandatory advance notice of 8 days to all the members of EC, which is very important. It also states that even the last election for the post of Vice-Chairman held on December 30, 2015 suffered from the same infirmity, which too was hushed up during Christmas and New Year holidays through emergent Executive Committee. Meanwhile, the minutes of the emergent executive committee meeting held in Mumbai on March 8, is still awaited. The cut-off date for determining the eligibility to vote by remote e-voting is March 16.
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