IFFCO’s Kalol erupted into pure joy as soon as the music by Shankar Mahadevan IFFCO..mitti ki jaan..IFFCO kisan ki shan began to rent the air on the occasion of a grand opening of the 50th year of the cooperative giant. And those who were filled with an ungovernable urge to sing and clap included everyone including MD Dr U S Awasthi and his wife Mrs Rekha Awasthi.
The slogan of IFFCO was kissing the sky, as it were, in the huge playground of Kasturi Nagar township in Kalol housing thousands of IFFCO employees, their families and kids. Boys and girls drawn from the audience soon landed near dais and made a circular dance troupe to lend a unique flavor to the show.
Contributing in the euphoria IFFCO MD said since IFFCO started its operation from the holy land of Kalol it could reach such heights to the thunderous applause of audience. Explaining his reasons to choose Kalol as the venue for grand celebrations Awasthi said those who forget their roots reach nowhere.
When it was decided that IFFCO would set up a plant people would dismiss it. They always thought cooperative
could at best run small village stores. We had issues convincing people to buy IFFCO shares, Awasthi said tracing the struggle early leaders faced in setting up the grand cooperative we know today.
He paid tributes to the first Chairman Uday Bhan Singh and first MD Paul Pothen for their role in establishing IFFCO as a name to reckon with in the world. Narrating anecdotes from the past for the new generation of IFFCO employees he stressed “whatever may come we do not have to forget the basic mantra and that is the good of farmers”. The theme of our celebrations’ Mitti ki jaan kisan ki shan’ fits in with our scheme of things very well, he said lauding the team for making it a huge success.
Corporate film of IFFCO in both Hindi and English was unveiled by N P Patel and Gowda respectively. Joint MD Rakesh Kapoor released the in-house magazine Kasturi on the occasion.
IFFCO also launched a part of its corporate film as commercials on Prime Time television shows from Thurday evening to commenmorate its 50th birthday.
Cultural programmes –song, dance, drama, and fictions were presented enthralling the audience for long three hours. The history of IFFCO, its struggle and its achievements were presented through art form. At the end of the show, each employee felt a s sense of pride to belong to IFFCO. It is our family and we are proud to belong to it, said many to this correspondent.
