Constitution of ‘Association of Physiologists of India’

1. Name of the Organization and Registered Office:
   The name of the association is Association of Physiologists of India, (ASSOPI) which will be hence forward designated as ‘Association’ or ASSOPI.
   The Registered office of ASSOPI is located at Dept. of Physiology, JIPMER, Puducherry.
2. Aim and Objectives
   The Aim of ASSOPI is exclusively to promote advancement in academic, scientific and research activities related to Physiology in India.
   It is for the furtherance of these purposes that the Objectives of ASSOPI shall be:
   1. To promote all the possible and feasible measures as will contribute to the development of physiological science in India.
   2. To integrate physiology as a subject with various branches of clinical medicine to make physiology more clinical and translational.
   3. To foster and encourage research in the Physiological Sciences in India.
   4. To hold Scientific Meeting of ASSOPI annually.
   5. To publish a scientific journal of the association periodically.
   6. To provide a common forum for interaction, exchange and dissemination of knowledge and expertise between the members of ASSOPI in Physiological Science and related fields.
   7. To facilitate the building of professional careers of physiologists of India.
   8. To facilitate the coordination between national and international professional bodies in the field of physiology such as Federation of Indian Physiological Societies (FIPS),The Physiological Society Of India (PSI), The Association of Physiologists and Pharmacologists of India (APPI), South Asian Association of Physiologists (SAAP), International Union of Physiological Sciences  (IUPS), American Physiological Society (APS), European Physiological Society (EPS), The International Brain Research Organization (IBRO) and other international societies of physiologists.
   9. Establish zonal chapter & branches and promote their activities.
3. Membership and Membership Fees
   Any person having a graduate or postgraduate degree in Physiology or allied sciences can become a member of ASSOPI. Students pursuing PG course in Physiology or allied subjects are also eligible to become ASSOPI members. There are 2 types of membership: Life membership and Annual membership. The lifetime membership fee is Rs. 3,000/-, to be paid in one instalment (one-time payment). Annual membership fee is 500/-. Life members will be entitled to avail the copy of official journal of ASSOPI, travel grants (if any) of ASSOPI, to contest for ASSOPI Awards and will have voting right in the general body during their life time. Annual members will be entitled to avail the electronic copy of official journal of ASSOPI, travel grants (if any) of ASSOPI and will contest for ASSOPI Awards only for the year of their membership. However, annual members will have no voting right in the general body.
   Disqualification of a member: Any life member whose acts are found to be prejudicial to the interest of the association shall be disqualified by the General Body, on recommendations of the Executive Committee. If three fourths of the attending members vote in favour of such disqualification; he shall cease to be a member and shall not be entitled to any refund of the subscription. The member whose expulsion is being proposed will be duly informed and will be given an opportunity of being heard at the meeting or being represented there at by another member nominated by him in writing who will speak on his / her behalf. A vote on the committee’ motion of expulsion shall be taken by ballot in which members unable to attend the meeting may record their votes in writing.
4. The Organizational Set-up:
   i)  President:  One post
   The President will be the custodian of the association. He will chair all Executive Body (EB) and General Body (GB) meetings of the association, and any official meeting convened by the association. He will preside over the Inaugural Ceremony of the annual conference of the association.
   ii)  Vice-Presidents: Four posts
   Four vice-presidents will be from four geographical zones of the country, viz, North zone (Jammu & Kashmir, Uttarakhand, Harayana, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhatishgarh), South zone (Telengana, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil nadu, Karnataka, Pondicherry, Kerala), East zone (Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Odisha, Assam, Sikkim, Nagaland, Manipur, Tripura, Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram) and West zone (Gujrat, Rajasthan, Goa, Maharastra).
   Vice-presidents will assist president in the executive works of the association. In absence of President, the senior most (No. of days as a Professor) vice-president will chair all EB and GB meetings of the association. He will preside over the Inaugural Ceremony of the annual conference of the association.
   iii)  General Secretary: One post
   General Secretary will be the executive authority of the association, will carry out all administrative responsibilities of the association and will implement the decisions of the GB and EB of the association.
   To run the executive office, General Secretary will nominate a life member of his/her choice from the local area as ‘Office Secretary’ to assist him/her in his/her routine and organizational works of ASSOPI.
   The Office Secretary to General Secretary will be the member of Executive Body of the association.
   iv) Joint Secretary : Four posts
   Administrative responsibilities of General Secretary will be shared by 4 joint secretaries, one from each zone.
   v) Finance Secretary:
   Finance secretary will keep and maintain the account of ASSOPI. The General Secretary of the association in consultation with Finance secretary will nominate a life member ASSOPI from the local area as the Head Quarter Office Secretary. ‘Head Quarter Office Secretary’ will be an EB member of the association. Finance secretary in consultation with General Secretary and President will make all the financial transactions. The General Secretary, Finance Secretary, Head Quarter Office Secretary (any two of them) will be the signatories to all financial transactions of ASSOPI.
   vi)  Executive Body Members:
   There will be 20 EB members, approximately representing various parts of the country. Convener and secretary from all zonal chapters and branches will be allowed to attend EB meeting without voting right in executive meeting.
   All office bearers and EB members will have equal voting right.
5. ASSOPI Journal of Physiology (AJP)
   As AJP has not be started yet, the association has taken a decision to make International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Physiology (IJCEP) as the official organ of ASSOPI. Dr. G. K. Pal who has started this journal as EIC with Head Office at Department of Physiology, JIPMER Puducherry will be the Executive Editor of the journal. EIC will be selected/elected every two years as per bylaws of the association.
   
   The office of Dr. G. K. Pal currently the office of ED & CEO, AIIMS Patna will be the executive office of the journal.
   
   
6. Office Bearers
   The following 15 members of ASSOPI will be designated as office bearers (OB) of the association.
   1. President
   2. General Secretary
   3. Founder President
   4. Immediate Past President
   5. Four Vice-Presidents
   6. Finance Secretary
   7. Executive Editor, IJCEP
   8. Editor-in-Chief, IJCEP
   9. Four Joint Secretaries
7. Tenure and Eligibility of Office Bearers and EB Members:
   All office bearers and EB members will be elected by the General Body of ASSOPI, for which nominations will be called by General Secretary, along with the nomination for awards of ASSOPI, through the official news bulletin. The tenure of elected office bearers will be for a period of ‘two years’. The following criteria should be fulfilled to contest for the post of office bearers of ASSOPI
   1. President: Should be a life member of ASSOPI with minimum of 20 years standing as a Physiologist, after obtaining MD/PhD degree.
   2. Vice-Presidents: Should be a life member of ASSOPI with minimum of 15 years standing as a Physiologist, after obtaining MD/PhD degree.
   3. General Secretary: Should be a life member of ASSOPI with minimum of 15 years standing as a Physiologist, after obtaining MD/PhD degree.
   4. Finance Secretary: Should be a life member of ASSOPI with minimum of 10 years standing as a Physiologist, after obtaining MD/PhD degree.
   5. Editor-in-Chief: Should be a life member of ASSOPI with minimum of 15 years standing as a Physiologist, after obtaining MD/PhD degree, and must have minimum 10 research publications in PubMed indexed journals.
   6. Joint Secretaries: Should be a life member of ASSOPI with minimum of 8 years standing as a Physiologist, after obtaining MD/PhD degree.
   7. EB Members: Should be a life member of ASSOPI with minimum of 5 years standing as a Physiologist, after obtaining MD/PhD degree
8. Annual Conference of ASSOPI:
   For conducting Annual conferences, academic and other infrastructure of the institute proposed to organize the conference should be assessed by office bearers, a year before the conference, before giving permission for holding annual conference. A checklist should be made to assess the merit of a center to organize annual conference of ASSOPI. For getting approval of GB to organize the conference, the organizing secretary has to produce an authorization letter from head of the institute for conducting the conference. The organizing secretary of the annual conference should be a life member of ASSOPI and should have attended at least 2 annual conferences. Though preferably the annual conference should be conducted during October-December, the exact dates, duration, theme and scientific content of the conference will be decided by the organizing committee. All financial transactions for the conference should be operated by a bank account in the name of the conference opened in the national bank in the city. The 5% of the total money collected for organizing the annual conference (that includes delegation fees, collections from funding agencies, money raised by advertisement in conference souvenir, and stalls put up at conference venue by equipment or book companies etc.) should be contributed to ASSOPI. After the conference, preferably within six months, an audited report of the conference expenses should be sent to the ASSOPI head quarter for record.
9. Zonal Chapters and Branches:
   Efforts should be made to start zonal chapters and branches of ASSOPI. Respective VPs and joint secretaries of zones should make sincere efforts to form chapters in the respective zones under their supervision. For zonal chapters, there will be a Branch President, Branch-Vice President, Branch Secretary, a Branch Treasurer and about 5 Branch EB members to be nominated / elected by the zonal chapter in consultation with the vice president and joint secretary of respective zone. All ‘Branch activities’ should be conducted under the banner of ASSOPI. The secretary of the ASSOPI branch should obtain a written approval from President/General Seceretary of ASSOPI for holding local CME/Symposium/ Workshop/Conference. For all financial transactions of zonal chapters and branches, a bank account in the name of the chapter should be opened in a national bank in their locality, which should be jointly operated by secretary and treasurer of the chapter. Internally audited report of financial expenses (February of previous year to March of that year) of the branches should be submitted to ASSOPI, every year preferably by end of May, that year
10. Attendance in Executive Body Meeting:
    All the office bearers of ASSOPI, EB members of ASSOPI and Convener or Secretary approved by ASSOPI can participate in EB meeting, which will be held during conference, preferably before the inauguration of annual conference. Conference Organizing Secretary will be the special invitee for the EB meeting to be held during the conference.
11. General Body Meeting:
    General body will be the supreme in all aspects of ASSOPI. All the important decisions of office bearers and executive body must be endorsed by the general body. The GB will be held during annual conference, preferably on the second day. Only the life-members of ASSOPI will have voting right in GB. An Emergency GB may be called under special circumstances, with minimum 15 days-notice to all the life members, to address emergency issues of the association. At least one-third of the life members of the association should be present to have the quorum for the GB meetings.
12. Fellowship Title:
    FAPI: The ASSOPI will confer Fellowship title “FAPI” (Fellow of Association of Physiologists of India) to eligible members. Every year, maximum of five numbers of Fellowship title can be given to eligible members of ASSOPI. The General Secretary through ‘ASSOPI News Letter’ will circulate to all the members of ASSOPI inviting application for fellowship title along the invitation for ASSOPI Awards. A member with minimum 20 years post-MD or Post-PhD teaching and research experience and with minimum of 10 PubMed indexed publications will be eligible to apply for Fellowship title. However, eligibility of the applicant for the fellowship does not guarantee the conferment of fellowship. A committee duly constituted by office bearers of ASSOPI will scrutinize the application and finalize the list of members (maximum five in a year) for the fellowship title. Rupees one thousand should be paid as application fee (non-refundable) and rupees ten thousand should be paid by the nominee along with the application for the fellowship. The recipient of fellowship title can add ‘FAPI’ as a fellowship degree to his name. If the applicant does not receive the fellowship title, the money paid by him will be refunded to him within one month of finalization of the fellowship list.
13. Institution of Awards/ New Awards
    Following awards have been instituted by the association:
    1. Prof. A. S. Paintal Award for best research work in Physiology
    2. Dr. Artatran Nanda Memorial Award for best research work in Respiratory Physiology
    3. Prof. S. B. Deshpande Award for best research work in Neurophysiology
    4. Prof. G. K. Pal Award for best research work in Cardiovascular Physiology
    5. JIPMER Golden ASSOPICON Award for best research work conducted by a postgraduate student in Physiology
    6. Mr. S. N. Choudary Memorial Award for best research work in Environmental Physiology
    7. Sri Ram Murthy Memorial Award for best research work in Yoga and Naturopathy
    8. Prof. S. K. Singh Award for best research work conducted by an undergraduate medical student
    9. Ramesh Bijlani Lifetime Achievement Award in Medical Sciences
    10. Shri B. M. Patil Memorial Award for best research work in physiology by a Scientist below the age of 45 years
    11. Prof. Narsingh Verma Award for best research work in Chronobiology
    Institution of New Awards: The application for institution of new awards of ASSOPI will be reviewed by a committee (Committee for scrutinization of award proposals) of ASSOPI. For any new award to be introduced in the name of a person, the person concerned should have substantial contribution in the particular field of academics and research. For a ‘Research award’, the name of the person nominated for the award should have a minimum of 15 PubMed indexed publications in the concerned field of research. For a ‘Memorial award’, the person in whose memory the award will be instituted, should have some standing in the concerned field. The committee (Committee for securitization of award proposals) duly constituted for the purpose will assess the merit of the proposal, and the recommendation of the committee will be placed before the EB and GB for approval.
    The award will have a citation and a plaque. The corpus fund for the award should be sufficient enough to sustain the money required for making citation and the plaque annually. The corpus fund (the money for institution of the award) should not be less than five lakhs, which should be paid as one time payment to the association. However, the minimum corpus fund for the award will be revised from time to time so as to generate the adequate money from the interest of the fixed deposit of the corpus fund to make every year the citation and the plaque of the award
14. Association News Letter:
    A bimonthly newsletter should be published by General Secretary of ASSOPI and circulated to all members of ASSOPI through e-mails, and should be displayed in the ASSOPI website.
15. Fund-raising, Bank Account and Audited Report:
    The fund for the association can be raised through advertisements in ASSOPI website, news-letter and ASSOPI journal, donations to the association and award seed-money. The organizing secretary of the annual conference should contribute a minimum of 5% of money collected from organization of the conference (that includes delegation fees, advertisements, stalls at conference venue, etc.) to the association.
    For smooth financial transactions, the treasurer should preferably be from the city of head office of ASSOPI (Puducherry). All the audited-expenses of the association and of the journal for the preceding financial year will be presented by General Secretary and Editor-in-Chief of ASSOPI journal respectively in the EB meeting and GB meeting to be held during the conference. Also, they will present their annual reports in the EB and GB.
16. Others:
    Organizing secretary of the annual conference should be a life member of ASSOPI and should have attended at least two annual conferences of ASSOPI.
    Office bearers of ASSOPI are eligible for ASSOPI Awards and fellowship title during their tenure.