“Reining in WAPIZ”

A friend drew my attention to "Reining in WAPIZ” (Editorial Viewpoint, Parsiana, February 21, 2012) only recently, hence this delayed response.

Your fascination with my representing Khergam at the Federation of the Parsi Zoroastrian Anjumans of India (FPZAI) meetings has led you to fixate on this point, which you have highlighted in issue after issue, while conveniently ignoring the far more disturbing happenings at the FPZAI meeting on February 11 and 12. There was rampant mis-governance by Bombay Parsi Punchayet (BPP) chairman and FPZAI president Dinshaw Mehta at that meeting and the 33-member executive council as well as the general body were bypassed and made redundant by his dictatorial "rulings” on both days, which your editorial is silent on!

Rule 6 of the FPZAI memorandum, which allows for proxies to attend Federation meetings, is clearly your bugbear. Be that as it may, the least you could have done was to have acknowledged that the World Alliance of Parsi Irani Zarthoshtis (WAPIZ) has always worked within the framework of the rules in general and Rule 6 in particular. The same however, cannot be said of the president. WAPIZ introduces proxies for anjumans who are members of the Federation. Mehta, on the other hand, brought in proxies for anjumans who were not members (five of them having resigned in 2009 and the Udvada Sodfalia Anjuman being a new applicant).

You name the proxies that WAPIZ may have introduced but do not reveal the names of proxies from the six Gujarat anjumans which Mehta unilaterally gave membership to on the eve of the election. Mehta’s right hand man in Panthaky Baug, Bombay, Pervez Driver, represented Bhatha; his friend/business partner, Khushru Khobyar, who manages a bar in the Grant Road area, represented "Surat;” his second-in-command in Panthaky Baug, Noshir Karanjia, represented Bhesan; his close friend, Kersi Sethna from Bombay represented Bhagva village; his friend of 40 years Farokh Irani (not to be mixed up with Farokh Irani, president of the Poona Parsi Panchayat) represented "Surat.” With Mehta’s cousin Yasmine Sanjana (née Mehta) who resides in Bombay’s Godrej Baug representing Tavdi, his cousin Pervez Mehta being trustee of Bardoli, Yasmine’s husband Kersi Sanjana, a trustee in Bardoli and Dinshaw’s son Viraf Mehta (representing the BPP as marked by him in the attendance sheet), our good old Federation has become The Dinshaw Mehta Federation of family and friends! But Parsiana was too busy setting its gun-sights on WAPIZ, to notice this takeover!

In response to protests at the meeting that the six Gujarat trusts/anjumans as well as the Udvada Sodfalia Anjuman could not be given membership till their application for membership was put before the executive council, the president said that it was not necessary to go to the council as these anjumans (where the proxies were all his close buddies) were simply "prodigal sons” who should be welcomed back with open arms!

All this came at a time when Mehta’s candidate Darayas Master would almost certainly have lost the election against incumbent vice president Areez Khambatta had it not been for the last minute addition of these six anjumans. This should speak louder than all the rhetoric indulged in by the president that day and lay the charge of "malfeasance, skullduggery and horse-trading” (referred to in your editorial), squarely at his doorstep!

In your editorial you have stated that I apologized for my lack of knowledge of the constituency I profess to represent. My statement that "Poor Khergam is being made to pay the price for allowing me to attend” was clearly an expression of my resentment at the president targeting and persecuting the Khergam trustees wrongly, because of his so-called "divorce” from WAPIZ. How could you have construed it to be an apology for lack of knowledge of what is happening in Khergam?

Allow me to enlighten your readers as to what actually is happening in Khergam. During his report Sorab Katpitia of the defunct anjumans subcommittee stated that the president had directed him to file a scheme of administration in Khergam. What this actually means is asking for the removal of the present trustees! Surely, there should be some evidence of mismanagement or financial impropriety before such step is taken? In Khergam’s case, quite the contrary is true. Due to paucity of anjuman funds, for decades the trustees of Khergam, in particular the Khergam­walla brothers and Khushru Daruwalla, have been looking after the dadgah and safeguarding other anjuman property, using their personal funds!

When they had earlier asked for help from the Federation, it was not extended to them. The late Kersi Khergamwalla gave up a thriving business, sold his shop in Bombay and went to reside in Khergam permanently so that the dadgah could be well looked after. For nearly two years he personally did the daily cleaning inside the dadgah, at great cost to his deteriorating health, as a chasniwalla was not available. He died in Khergam two years back. The caretaker’s salary is being supplemented, and sometimes even paid entirely, even today, by trustee Pervez Khergamwalla, from his personal funds. The dakhma (defunct) property has also been safeguarded by the trustees against encroachments. The trustees have been litigating for years (again, using personal funds) to recover another anjuman property, three km away from Khergam on the Khergam-Chikhli road, which was encroached upon. The matter is at present before the revenue tribunal.

On what basis does the Federation now want to remove the trustees and take over the Khergam properties, especially when it has not helped in any way whatsoever when help was needed?

Pervez Khergamwalla’s angry outburst was in response to Katpitia’s statement, which implied removal of the present trustees. But you insinuate that the outburst was a result of the disservice done to Khergam by WAPIZ! The "disservice” to Khergam which you have wrongly sought to pin onto WAPIZ is entirely FPZAI’s doing, due to its neglect of Khergam’s needs (as indeed of the other smaller anjumans’) for the last 25 years or more. And it will surely be amplified if FPZAI allows false accusations to be leveled against the Khergam trustees, only because of the president’s personal "divorce” from WAPIZ!

Interestingly, the other anjuman targeted by the president that day for "filing a scheme” and removal of the trustees was Badnera-Amravati, which was represented by WAPIZ chief executive officer Anahita Desai, making it amply clear that these machinations were more about his bullying tactics and vengeful actions than about good governance!

If I may be allowed a little side note on the "divorce,” it was rather well-timed by the president, seeing how he allied with WAPIZ to win his BPP election, and then used WAPIZ for three years (without finding any fault whatsoever with its ideology or working) to fight his battles with his adversary Alert Zoroastrians Association and others in the courts and outside. He dumped the organization only after most of the cases were settled, and when he saw that his personal power base in the BPP would be eroded with Anahita Desai stepping in! The one point you have correctly assessed is that the WAPIZ-Mehta marriage was simply not worth saving.

The FPZAI has an executive council of 33 independent-minded members. To insinuate that they are all dummies put up by WAPIZ is an insult to their intelligence and integrity. It is clear that the so-called threat of a WAPIZ "takeover” was simply a bogey raised by the president to sideline the council in order to get his own way. I sincerely hope that the council will not remain a silent spectator to these manipulations.

TANNAZ PARAKH

tsparakh@hotmail.com

A copy of this letter was sent to Dinshaw Mehta, asking if he wished to respond to the allegations and if so to reply by April 24, 2012. No response was received by that date or till the time of going to press, April 30. — The editors.