Q. Please introduce yourself and tell us about IITF in detail.
A. I am J. Guna Sekaran. I am the general manager at ITPO. India International Trade Fair has been happening every year since last 37 years. It is the biggest consumer show in India and lacs of people visit it. This year we had to function at 52% space because of the redevelopment work. To organise such a grand fair, involving so many states and even countries, is a very complex task. We have participation from all most all the sectors and all types of parties are involved, be it B2B, B2C, B2G and G2G. This year we have got all the 32 states participation and 42 government departments and corporate exhibitors which are in excess of 3000 in this event. We have 222 companies from 21 countries this year, the partner country is Vietnam while Kyrgyzstan is the Focus Country. Jharkhand is participating as a Partner State in the event.
This year we had the fair open for B2B from 14th – 17th November and from 18th onwards for general public. The exhibitors are fairly pleased with the fair and the arrangements here. Being a govt. body, we give the stalls at very good rates for participation so that the private companies get maximum benefits of participation. So any exhibition organized by ITPO is always received very nicely among the business community .
ITPO is also promoting exhibitions in South through the Chennai Trade Centre. CTC belongs to Tamil Nadu Trade Promotion Organisation. This organisation is basically a joint venture between ITPO and Government of Tamil Nadu . ITPO holds 51 percent share of the CTC which was opened in 2001. Booking is going very strong there, as almost every business event in that location is held at the Chennai Trade Centre.
The theme of the event this year is ‘Start up India – Stand up India.’ The vision of our PM is to have more job givers than job seekers and for that, it is essential to have a good eco-system for entrepreneurs. The dedicated zone for start ups here has all the essential schemes and policies for the entrepreneurs which will make them quite aware of the procedures of setting up a business in India. More than 200 companies are present in the Start Up zone.
