Calcutta, July 28: It’s tie-up time at the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta (IIMC).
From joining hands with leading universities for research projects to hooking up to technology platforms to spread knowledge, the B-school is going places.
IIMC is partnering the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Yale University for research. While the first project is on assessing the role of women leaders in the country’s panchayat system, another is aimed at developing a proper incentive system to ensure good governance.
Unicef and the two Ivy League universities will fund the twin projects with a grant of Rs 1.1 crore.
“These are joint research projects with the best universities in the world. The focus is on development economics. Not only will the institute benefit, the projects will throw up inputs for policy-making,” said Raghabendra Chattopadhyay, who will lead the research initiatives.
From gender inequality to healthcare, the projects will address key social sector problems.
IIMC is also scaling up its initiatives on knowledge dissemination. The institute has signed a string of memoranda of understanding with telecom and information technology giants such as Reliance, Hughes Telecom and NIIT Technologies to extend the reach of its management development programmes.
“Executive education has grown substantially over the past few years and IIM Calcutta has been in the forefront of developing long-distance and long-duration programmes. These programmes are aimed at different segments and have had a tremendous response,” said Sushil Khanna, chairman, management development programmes, IIMC.
The technology tie-ups are aimed at further strengthening the delivery system. Reliance and Hughes will provide the requisite technology platforms ? VSAT links, software, satellite transmission feeds and virtual classrooms ? to bridge the physical distance between the campus and its students.
The institute will export both long-duration and short-term programmes to Dubai, Colombo, Dhaka and Singapore once the technology backbone is ready.
“By taking our programmes abroad, we can benchmark our offerings with the best B-schools from around the world. It also provides our faculty with the necessary international exposure,” Khanna said.
Management development programmes are not only important for the institute’s brand, they are also a good source of income. In 2005-06, IIMC earned Rs 10 crore from executive education and it is expecting a 15 to 20 per cent growth next fiscal.
“These programmes, along with research and consultancy projects, help us to subsidise our two-year flagship post graduate management programme,” Khanna said.
