The Animation Society of India (TASI), the voluntary non-profit organisation which has since the past 4 years been pushing the cause of animation and animators in the country held elections to its managing committe recently.

Elected on September 30, the new managing committee sports three fresh faces (for TASI) including MEL CEO Rajesh Turakhia, Vaibhav Studios Director Vaibhav Kumaresh and Studio Systems' Anil Chopra.

Former TASI secretary 2nz CEO Kireet Khurana has retired by rotation and animation producer Ranjit Singh has been elected to the post.

The new committee of TASI is follows

-Ram Mohan - President

- Ranjit 'Tony' Singh - Secretary

- Rajesh Turakhia - Jt. Secretary

- Anil Chopra - Treasurer

- Vaibhav Kumaresh

- Yogi Chopra

- Mohenish Gupta

- Sanjiv Waeerkar

"It has been one of the most wonderful experiences being with TASI and helping it nurture and grow" outgoing TASI secretary and founder member Kireet Khurana told Animation 'xpress.

"TASI started amidst much skepticism about the ability of the industry to collaborate with each other and I am glad as a founder member that we have been able to break the barriers of mistrust. Over the past 4 years we have done over 70 events and today as I step down TASI is the biggest non profit animation related body in the country with 275 members" said Kireet.

"Of course the numbers have to grow much more than what they are and I am sure that with the inclusion of Rajesh Turakhia & Anil Chopra TASI will grow beyond the 1000 mark which was what we founder members intended to do but were unable to do so due to prior commitments and lack of infrastructure and funds" he added.

"My not being in the committee does not mean my relinquishing my responsibility of giving back to the industry, which I shall do so in a much more open way now without the organisational and administrative hassles of running an organisation" concluded Kireet.

Freshly elected TASI secretary Ranjit Singh spoke about TASI's outlook in the coming 12 months saying,"Our first task at hand is streamlining our operations and completing certain pending formalities. We want to put into place a system that can run efficiently with minimum supervision. Being a voluntary non-profit organisation, our developement and growth is directly proportional to the selfless efforts of our members. We wish to create an atmosphere where a lot more of our time is spent on giving value add to the community. We have plans to increase our member base and to revitalise the open sessions and workshops. You will soon see an important initiative in that direction. We also aim to introduce interactive sessions for students. Few people know that we have a corporate membership plan. This will be initiated over the following year"

"We are already involved with Asifa India as Co-sponsors for International Animation day on October 28. You will see a lot more of such collaborations in future. ANIFEST '06 is eagerly awaited. We also wish to see TASI become a focal point for important issues related to this industry and we aim to get the support of all concerned to enable us to take that position" he added.

As far as upcoming TASI events are concerned I can announce one at the moment. To be held after IAD'05 we will present a lecture demonstration featuring Vaibhav Kumaresh and his 3 month stint at Belfast. I think it will be of immense value. We are also planning a session on special effects with industry experts" informed Ranjit.