GOPIO International Team Sworn-in With Lal Motwani As New President
India-West Staff Reporter
NEW YORK, NY – The Global Organization of People of Indian Origin (GOPIO) sworn to office, on March 4, its new team in a virtual ceremony.
Veteran community leader from New York, Lal Motwani took office as the organization’s new President. Motwani is a founder and life member of GOPIO and was serving as the International Coordinator-at-Large and later as Executive Trustee of GOPIO Foundation in his last term.
Others sworn in at the ceremony are: Umesh Chandra from Brisbane, Australia as Executive Vice President; Los Angeles area community leader Kewal Kanda as Vice President; New Jersey businessman Prakash Shah as Global Ambassador, and community activist Jasbir ‘Nami’ Kaur as International Coordinator-at-Large.
Five more Regional International Coordinators were also sworn-in: Businessman Roger Latchman from Johannesburg, South Africa as Africa Coordinator; Engineering Entrepreneur Deo Gosine (Trinidad and New York) as Caribbean Coordinator; Real Estate Investor Ashok Madan of Southern California as North America Coordinator; engineer Harmohan Singh Walia of Sydney, Australia as Oceania Coordinator and New Delhi businessman Dhiraj Ahuja as South Asia Coordinator.
The election was conducted according to the GOPIO bylaws by a team of the Interim Committee which was appointed by the GOPIO General Body Meeting held on January 14.
The ceremony started with a universal prayer song by Devika Gadhavi. Dr. Thomas Abraham, Chairman of GOPIO welcomed the participants from all continents and provided a brief introduction to the birth of GOPIO and many of its achievements in the last 34 years. Abraham also highlighted the services provided by GOPIO Chapters during the pandemic.
“GOPIO chapters around the world have been doing a lot of organizational groundwork in many countries to promote leadership in public service and the thrust have been to promote and involve the Indian Diaspora in the larger society and local communities wherever they live,” said Dr. Abraham.
Motwani in his speech said, “We will soon activate those regions which are not active now and we will get all the councils to become active again. We need many volunteers to get involved in the Councils such as Human Rights, Cultural, Academic, Women, Science and Technology, Youth and Young Professionals, Media, Health, and Wellness and on Seniors. We will officially launch GOPIO Chamber of Commerce (GICC) in different parts of the world.”
The program ended with music by GOPIO-Edison President Pallavi Belwariar.
