New Town: St. Xavier's University's B-school in Calcutta has been modelled on XLRI Jamshedpur and is on schedule to welcome its first batch of students next July.

Xavier Business School is part of the university's 17-acre New Town campus, located around 3km from Tata Medical Center.

"It is being equipped with all the facilities available in the best business schools in the country. Our target is to develop a world-class institute," Father Felix Raj, vice-chancellor of the university, told Metro.

The B-school will offer a two-year postgraduate programme in business administration with specialisation in finance, marketing, HR and systems.

A Wi-Fi campus, air-conditioned classrooms equipped with audio-visual systems, an amphitheatre, a digital library with 24-hour access for students and teachers, hostels with AC rooms, a food court, doctor on call and a placement cell that will network with top companies are some of the facilities that will be available from the day of the institute's launch, Felix Raj said.

Entry into Xavier Business School will be through the Xavier Aptitude Test (XAT) and GMAT, just like at XLRI Jamshedpur and the Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar.

The first batch will have 120 students in two sections. The All India Council for Technical Education that regulates management education has granted permission for 180 seats.

Teacher recruitment is to start in January. "We expect to attract some of the best teachers," Felix Raj said.

"As a business school, we must know what the industry wants. We can design our curriculum according to their requirements. We are constantly in touch with some big companies. Representatives of several companies will be on our advisory board," he said.

The total fees for the two-year programme has been fixed at Rs 12.5 lakh, including Rs 2.5 lakh as hostel costs.