Sunil Sethi wears two hats. He is the senior vice-president of the world’s biggest trade sourcing company, Li & Fung, and is also the president of the Fashion Design Council of India (FDCI). The nodal fashion body has been in the news for all the wrong reasons.
A fight broke out between two factions and allegations were traded thick and fast. Finally, some members broke away and formed the Fashion Foundation of India. Sethi tells Archana Jahagirdar what lies ahead.
What is your vision for the fashion industry?
I have come at a time when the need of the hour is solidarity. My first step is to stop fragmentation and I feel that the initial effort has been encouraging.
A lot of people have started believing in FDCI again and participation from the designers is now 100 per cent. My job becomes easier since the council members are willing to participate.
For the forthcoming fashion week, sub-committees have already been formed. A new energy which has come into the council.
Is there any attempt to fill the post of the director-general which Rathi Vinay Jha held till last month and which was in the eye of the storm?
For me, the post is an honourary one and I cannot spend the entire day here. So, there is a new chief operating officer, Tridib Sengupta. He has vast experience with some of the best international banks and he has also worked with fashion designer Rohit Bal for two years. FDCI has ambitious plans.
Could you elaborate on what these ambitious plans are?
We are organising the couture week in Mumbai next month. This will be a grand event in which 12 of our leading fashion designers will participate. We are targeting the domestic as well as the NRI market.
We also have interest from the West Asian markets. This is going to be an annual event. After this, we take some of the designers to the Tranoi fair in Paris in the first week of October. The same month, we have the fashion week in Delhi.
We have also tied up with the Rajasthan government to host a fashion seminar which will highlight the craft of the region. We are also trying to bring in more transparency in the system so that more and more designers get opportunities here as well as abroad.
Would this extend to those designers who have not participated in FDCI-organised events so far?
We have an open door and an open arm policy towards those designers who have not participated in our events. The bottom line is that we want our designers to do well. This council is the designers’ council. I am only holding guard temporarily.
An open door policy is the best way to encourage more and more designers. I am all for a single important event than several small events which will cause inconvenience to everybody. I do not want any more divisions.
Couture internationally is a title that only a handful of designers and fashion houses can use. Will FDCI have the same stringent norms as the ones that exist in Paris for choosing designers who can call themselves as couturiers?
This being the first such event and the fact that we have a very good sponsor, we will this time depend on their list of designers. Going forward, we will definitely have criteria to decide the participants. But we will have less stringent criteria than what the French have. In case of a sponsorship, FDCI will not decide as to who will do couture.
What is FDCI’s position in relation to the Fashion Foundation of India?
If they bring something new to the table to promote Indian fashion, we do not have a problem. However, we are in disagreement with two fashion weeks happening at the same time. There is a limited talent pool in the fashion industry in terms of make-up and hair stylists, choreographers, stylists etc.
This cost is going up because of this divide. Most people will agree that at this nascent stage a show of solidarity is more important.
