A Zonal website kicks off
It was a humid morning in early March. I was accompanied by PP Devang Goradia to the Santacruz Domestic Airport, Mumbai. Both of us were there at the behest of RI Director Manoj Desai, who was halting at Mumbai during his hectic multi-city travel.
He arrived, the usual smile, kem chho and a brisk: “Let’s sit there; not much time — just 30 minutes in transit before my next flight.”
This is only one of his several “transit meetings” since he has become RI Director.
But this has been his style ever since he has been elected as a RI Director. The ‘Transit meetings’ have become his forte, and he has new ideas all the time. Who can forget ‘My Voice, My Vote’ in Jaipur? Applauded and praised by everybody including PRIP K R Ravindran and General Secretary John Hewko, it promises to become an inevitable part of every Rotary Institute!
Manojbhai came out with the idea — “How about RI Zone 4, 5, 6A website? It has never been done before. A few Zones have their own websites.”
The idea was appealing; our zones are the busiest and among the most happening RI Zones in Rotary. With 39 Districts, we need to collate and display humongous work that our Districts keep doing year after year, through a single window. The work was enormous, and the Director is a hard taskmaster, but then we thought of his theme for the Dazzling Dubai Institute, ‘Nothing is impossible,’ and took up the challenge.
With assistance from RISAO, Dr Desai and his office, PDG Ashok Gupta, who had some ready data from the Jaipur Institute, and his office, we were on the job, which had to be speeded up as Dr Desai wanted the website to be inaugurated by TRF Trustee Chair Kalyan Banerjee on July 11 in Mumbai where he was being felicitated.
And it happened … in the presence of PRID Ashok Mahajan, DG Gopal Mandhania, and a galaxy of PDGs of D 3141 and 3142.
A new chapter in Zones 4, 5, and 6A has begun with www.rizones456a.com. The website will have many features. Apart from Zone info, bio-data, communication details of Rotary leaders including RI Presidents, RI Directors, TRF Trustees and others, it will have Zone newsletters, GMLs, Rotary events including Rotary Institutes, important projects and programmes of the district. Eventually the website aims to be the most comprehensive ‘single stop’ for the Zones.
My gratitude to PP Devang Goradia and his office staff who worked very hard to get this venture going.
(The writer is PDG, RID 3141)
