In its 160th year, the Zoroastrian Trust Funds of Europe (ZTFE) reelected Malcolm Deboo as president for 2021-22 at the online annual general meeting (AGM) on December 16, 2021 when 45 households logged onto Zoom. ZTFE estimates that around 150 members, nearly a 10th of their total 1,500 members, attended the meet. Since the only nomination received for the president’s post was from Deboo, he came in uncontested. Deboo has been serving as president since November 2009.
They may have also elected to the august body their "first lady trustee in living memory” but have yet to confirm whether the new incumbent Bapsy Dastur (pictured) was preceeded by Lady Frainy Bomanji in the 1970s.
Kobad Avari, Darius Karkaria, vice president (external) Shenaz Sadri and Jesmin Sorab whose three-year term on the management committee expired this year, were also reelected unopposed as the number of candidates standing was equal to the number of available positions 48 hours prior to the AGM. In addition to Deboo and the four members who were reelected, the newly constituted ZTFE managing committee for 2021-2022 comprises vice president Behram Kapadia, secretary Rohinton Munshi, treasurer Javid Canteenwala, Gav Buhariwala, Parivash Kiani, Shazneen Munshi and past president Dorab Mistry.
Since Rusi Dalal’s second seven-year term as trustee had come to an end, he was reelected, making him the longest serving trustee currently on the ZTFE board. In place of Ervad Rustom Bhedwar who passed away in February 2020, Dastur who was elected as trustee for the first time joined the two veterans, Dalal and Ardeshir Bilimoria who is serving his second seven-year term.
Welcoming Dastur as trustee, Deboo’s email of December 22 introduced her as general counsel and head — Corporate Risk, Legal and Compliance at VFS Global, the world’s largest visa outsourcing and technology services specialist for governments and diplomatic missions. Associated with the ZTFE since the Second World Zoroastrian Youth Congress in 1997, she is now its life member and a loyal supporter, having donated to the "Everlasting Flame: Zoroastrianism in History and Imagination” exhibition at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in 2013. For the last three years she has been on the advisory board of the SOAS Shapoorji Pallonji Institute of Zoroastrian Studies.
Having qualified as a solicitor from Little and Company in Bombay, over the years she has worked for well-known multinationals in senior positions. She was general counsel, India and Middle East for General Electric, for ANZ Grindlays Bank now Standard Chartered in Dubai, as legal head, Middle East for ALSTOM ABB and as legal head, London head office for Stolt Nielsen. An effective communicator and influencer with keynote presentations at numerous international compliance conferences, Dastur was a member of the UK Foreign Office women’s delegation to Cambodia in 2020. She is also a director at TRACE International, a global organization that seeks to advance commercial transparency worldwide and raise the standard of anti-bribery compliance.
The ZTFE annual report for 2020-21 summed up the organization’s philanthropic and religious activities throughout the challenging year, aided by a bountiful bequest of £ 381,556 (Rs 3,84,18,453) from life members Dolly and Hoshang Khambatta.