Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Doctors, lawyer in IIM-C class

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KOLKATA: When postgraduate classes start at the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta, on June 23, there’s a surprise in store. Five doctors, a lawyer and a fashion designer are among those who have made it to the 2008 batch — and IIM-C old timers say that this is perhaps the first time that the institute has such a variety.

The five doctors feel being a manager would be more lucrative, what with the cushy working conditions and huge salaries that an IIM degree commands. But the lawyer and the fashion designer say they will stick to their core areas and feel the IIM education will enhance their potential and help them understand market dynamics.

Some of these doctors decided to quit the profession despite their parents being medics. Take the case of Rohan M Desai from Ahmedabad, whose father Mahadev is a famous orthopaedic surgeon and mother Beena an ophthalmologist. Again, Lav Kumar Beejal’s father Ramesh is not only an orthopaedic surgeon but also a teacher at the state general hospital at Jaipur, while Mudit Sharma’s father is a paediatrician at Lucknow.

“If I have to make a name for myself in the field of medicine, I would have to study for another 10 years before starting practice. Instead, an MBA degree will immediately get me a neat salary and great working conditions. I know that people will ask me why I wasted my time studying medicine. But the same applies to those multitudes of engineers who have been chucking their core training to become MBAs,” said Mudit, who earned his MBBS in 2007.

Another doctor, Balkrishna, feels that in the field of medicine one just “mugs textbooks”. “Not my kind of job,” Balkrishna says.

Dinesh Rizhwani, who notched up a 99.9 percentile score in CAT, also got his MBBS in 2007. He feels an MBA degree would help him specialize in healthcare management and would prepare him for an administrator’s job in a big hospital chain.

“Instead of treating patients I want to get into strategy planning in order to make international-standard healthcare competitively priced to suit the common man,” Rizhwani said. Dr Rohan Desai says he wants to get into rural healthcare management, which will be “the next big thing to happen in the country”.

For Gaurav Dayal, who has just passed out of National Law School, the two-year IIM-C stint would help him get into bigger law firms. “In this age of mergers and acquisitions, law firms works in tandem with bankers. If I have additional knowledge in finance, it would boost my market value,” Dayal said.

Similarly, Sulakshana S, a fashion designer who has worked with several boutiques in Mumbai, feels all this while her ideas would often get overruled to accommodate those who worked in the area of finance and marketing. “With an MBA degree, I would be able to overcome that shortcoming. I would also be able to start my own chain of branded fashion apparel stores,” she added.

Saturday, May 10, 2008

IIPM hits 2,000 domestic placements

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After the Buddhas smile, it is time for the IIPM students to giggle. It is not only the job offers from the domestic market, but also those from the international markets, that has created a huge amount of excitement and exuberance amongst the students.

It just can’t get any bigger or fatter at the IIPM Campus Placements. Keeping up to its reputation of being one of the most revered suppliers of quality management graduates to India Inc, the institute has already set new benchmarks for itself during the ongoing placement season for the Class of 2006-08 by hitting an all-time high of around 2,000 domestic placements and 100-plus international placements.

The placement season was kick-started in a grand style witnessing the presence of Satyam Computer Services, which picked up 60 students on Day 1 itself. It offered a whopping Rs 8.80 lakh per annum, the highest domestic package so far, to some of the students with reasonable experience; while the average package offered by them was a little over Rs 5 lakh per annum.

The regular recruiters like HSBC Bank, Pipal Research, Evalueserve.com, Oracle, HP, ICICI Bank, Reliance ADAG, who are also a part of the most favoured recruiters at IIPM, were given preferred slots for placement, as they had a bigger shopping bag to fill than ever before. Reliance Group recruited over 100 IIPM graduates from across all the 7 centres, at a package of Rs 6.30 lakh per annum.

The total number of placements as on March 18 stood at 2,014. This figure perhaps never achieved in the history of Indian institutes. The first time recruiters included Yes Bank (picked up 33 students in early January), Zee Entertainment (7), UB Group (14), among others. Euro RSCG also debuted on IIPM campus along with Colliers International and CB Richard Ellis.

After the Buddha’s smile, it is time for the IIPM students to giggle. It is not only the job offers from the domestic market, but also those from the international markets, that has created a huge amount of excitement and exuberance amongst the students. They have regularly pursued various global organisations before getting some of the biggest names on campus. The list of international recruiters include Emirates Neon (picked up 29 students), Al Sharaf group (9 ), Saud Bahwan Group (9 ) amongst others. The Al Sharaf group has offered the highest international package for the current batch at Rs 21.2 lakh per annum. As on 18th March 2008 the total number of international placements at 106 and a lot more to happen still.

According Arindam Chaudhuri, Hony Dean - Centre of Economic Research & Advanced Studies, “The placements this year has been magical especially at the international front. I expect this year the figure to finally touch anything between 150-200 given the fact that the investment banking specialisation at IIPM conducted by the extension arm of NUS is yet to get over. I would say that we are just getting warm up. Its next academic year IIPM will create real tremor in the placements scenario as if the current figures are anything less than earth shaking.”

Friday, May 9, 2008

IIM-A defends fee hike; says education ‘financially affordable’

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Facing flak over the recent hike in the fees, the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, has sought to justify the increase saying that education in the top B-school was ”financially affordable”.

”Based on the average compensation packages offered for placement within the country, the pay back period even at a fee level of Rs 5.5 lakh would be just four months,” the IIM-A said in a recent communication.

The efforts of IIM-A to defend its steep hike in the fee structure comes in the backdrop of a Parliamentary panel taking exception to the fee hike and suggested that the IIMs should wait for the report of the Bhargava committee, set up to review functioning of the Institutes.

However, to ensure that non-availability of funds did not come in the way of poor students seeking to pursue the two year post graduate programme, the IIM-A said it would become the first institute in the world to offer MBA programme at zero cost to poor students.

Under the unique arrangement, students who belong to families with annual income levels of upto Rs one lakh, could complete the two-year post graduate programme beginning next month.

The fee would vary from Nil for a student from family with annual income of upto Rs one lakh to Rs 5.5 lakh for a student from a family having an income of Rs six lakh and more.

”About 22 students from the batch starting June 2008 are expected to benefit from this unique arrangement,” the IIM-A said.

Tuesday, May 6, 2008

IIM-A list out with 6 pc quota for OBCs

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Ahmedabad: The Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) on Thursday published the list of candidates selected for its famed Post Graduate Programme (PGP).

The new list, enlisting 280 candidates, also includes 6 pc OBC quota reservations as ordered by the Supreme Court to implement quota in all centrally-run institutions.

Following the ruling of the apex court, the fresh intake division for the admission to the PGP batch stands as: 192 for general category, 17 (6 pc) for Other Backward Classes, 42 (15 pc) for Scheduled Castes and 21 (7.5 pc) for Persons with Disability, prior to which it was: 186 for general category, 38 for Scheduled Castes (15 pc), 19 for Scheduled Tribes (7.5 pc) and 8 for persons with Disability (3 pc).

“We have prepared the admission list as per the guidelines of the Moily Committee, which had been given the task of preparing a roadmap for implementing the quota for OBCs. This year we have made provisions for a 6 pc OBC quota. But within three years, the entire 27% reservation quota will be implemented in a phased manner”, an Admission Committee member said.

Further, Prof. Satish Deodhar, Chairman of the Admission Committee said, “May 19 is the last date for confirmation acceptance of admission for all candidates who have been offered admission to the PGP. We have declared the list of candidates belonging to all categories and their personal background will be known only after they accept admission offers on May 19. At present, those who have been offered admissions can check the status of their applications using their test registration number and date of birth”.

IIM-A is considered to be the best among the B-Schools in the country today.

Students appearing for the Common Admission Test (CAT) will feel some extra pressure on them after the quota comes into force.

Thursday, May 1, 2008

MBA aspirants cry for exposure

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Ranchi, April 30: Ranchi University management students rue that the lack of infrastructure and corporate exposure has spelt doom for their careers.

“Nowadays MNCs are looking for MBA pass-outs from reputed institutes. Our MBA centre under Ranchi University suffers from an identity crisis which needs to be addressed,” said Nishi Sinha, of 2004-06 batch, who was recruited by ICICI Prudential.

“Even though the management course was inaugurated in 2002, it started quite late so we completed the course six months late. During the placement, there was only one company that recruited three final-year MBA students. The selection criterion was based on GD, personal interview and written test,” said her batchmate Madan Kumar.

“Even the salary package offered to us is quite low — Rs 1.8 lakh to Rs 3 lakh annually. We lack in terms of infrastructure and the latest facilities and are unable to interact with students from XISS and XLRI. When I compare myself with others pursuing the same course in national institutions, I feel a little depressed, mainly owing to the treatment we receive afterwards,” added another student Rita Singh.

The Ranchi University Centre for MBA Studies, opened in 2002, is yet to be equipped with basic infrastructure, placement cells and faculty members. Though the head of department, S.B. Say, said that an AICTE recognition, which the centre had applied for, was not a necessity, the authorities had not compromised on quality. Say said: “We had started the course as we felt that the management courses have the potential to generate employment. We also felt that the students cannot spend lakhs for doing a course. So we kept a minimum admission fee.

“Besides, quality does not come in a day. We cannot boast of a sprawling campus, but we can certainly be proud of our standard of teaching and other technical facilities, including information technology gadgets.”

Officials said that from time to time they also invite speakers from abroad — like Harry Harris from the US, who had spoken on globalisation. “He appreciated the MBA centre of our university after his interaction with students,” added official.