The recent Hamfest India '97 in Cochin was remarkable for many things. The largest ham gathering ever in India; the number of high quality speeches, the number of stall displaying home brew equipments as well as commercial equipment and last but not least, the excellent arrangements made by the organisers. The Souvenir was also well brought out and contains valuable data, with important contribution by VU2SDN, VU2TS & others. However what struck me as most remarkable is the UNITY displayed by the participants - nobodywas bothered about which Association or Society you belonged to, or which region, or what your native language was, nor religion, nor colour of skin. The unifying factor was facination of HAM RADIO. In my key note address I tried to stress the importance of UNITY. As explained. UNITY is the key for future Ham development.

Once upon a time the entire wireless spectrum belonged to Amateurs. After 100 years of Wireless Communication, we have 95% of spectrum taken away by commercial interests. There was nobody to protect our rights. Gradually ARRL, RSGB and others woke up to the fact that we are losing our frequencies very fast and mobilised the ham community all over the world to protect some of our rights. Except for this action we would have lost all our frequencies. Today we are left with small spots in the various bands. This would not have been possible without the IARU & ARRL roping in all Amateur Societies and speaking with a single voice. What little remains (or sometimes regained) is the bequest of the dedicated amateurs from all over the world working and putting a United Front to ITU. In India we have similar problem. First of all, Amateur Rules are not a God given privilege. We have to fight hard for every inch. Hams in India don't realise where they would be without an All India Organization tacking the Government and the International Community of Telecom users.

By all means make more Clubs, Societies, Organization Classes etc. But when it comes to dealing with Government Of India or International Organizations, the National Society, ARSI, recognised by IARU, is the only voice that any body listens to.

Even in the case of Imported Yaesu Equipment, we could get concessions only because we are a national organizatiion affiliated to IARU. Many persons write directly to Yaesu. This is cutting your own throats and they are fed up with individual requests. They will respond only to ARSI and this again proves that all of your must support the national organizatiion or face extinction.

In conclusion, this is the comment of Bob Jones, Director ITU Radio Communication Bureau:-

"It is essential for you to speak with one voice even when there are genuine differences of view within the amateur community. Unless you are united, you will be the victims of the "divide & conquer" approach."

The Committee believes that this warning is timely and should not be ignored.

By Saad Ali - VU2ST