Why IIM Calcutta won't become IIM Kolkata

Okay this is the last post on anything to do with IIMC for some time to come I promise that. On the previous post my cheesy sardar friend commented “You could’ve inserted IIMC in at least two more places. You didn’t try hard enough :P”. Instead of being another useless post on the way of life in my school (which I believe anyhow occupies too much of server space of B-school websites and forums), it’s a more general comment on the education system of the country. This particular post is occasioned by several denizens of my school raising objections in our campus intranet about IIM Calcutta being erroneously (?) referred to as IIM Kolkata in the media. Apart from brand identity and regulatory issues (Eg. IIT Bombay is an autonomous body distinct from Mumbai and the normal city name-change regulations don’t apply to it) there’re some larger questions involved.

Nehru created the IITs and IIMs mainly to serve as a pipeline of high quality talent who will be expected to generate good ideas to take the economy forward. To avoid the usual problems infesting general higher education in India, he decided to take the help of marquee institutions of the world in establishing these colleges and did that from scratch. So Harvard helped set up IIMA and MIT helped set up IIMC. Similarly all first-world countries established the IITs. And to give due credit, they did a good job of it.

However there was one major oversight. The marquee institutions didn’t become iconic overnight. They had a long history of several centuries behind them and their progress was entwined with the progress of their host countries and more importantly host regions. For eg. MIT,Cornell etc came up with the passage of the Agricultural Act 1862. The aim of this act was to set up universities which teach workmanship and agriculture so that the local regions could be benefitted. All through their history these colleges have played pivotal role in the development of their regions. Entire cities and research hubs have come up near these places. To give an illustrative example, in Massachusetts , MIT alumni companies are estimated at 6900 having worldwide sales of $164 Billion which is 26% of sales of all Massachusetts companies. Interestingly only about 10% of MIT students are from the state while about 31% of MIT alumni companies are based in the state (Kauffman report).

Contrast that with the IITs and IIMs. They’ve the name of the city after them but the association ends there. Local projects (NGO and industry) don’t have any sheen attached to them and are usually done in an ad-hoc fashion by students. Most students don’t know the culture or history of the region that is hosting them and they couldn’t care less. These institutes are riding the huge demand supply mismatch created out of our skewed education system and have become plum-pickings for the MNCs who usually utilize this talent to help them capture markets abroad with new innovation and strategies.

I had a first-hand experience of this acute lack of good talent when I was consulting for a reputed NGO in my home town (Jhansi). They had lots of great work to offer which usually can be done in a span of 3-6 months but they were forced to rely on extremely sub-standard colleges situated in that region for the same. This is the situation everywhere especially in the major cities. The fact that hardly any of these projects make their way to the reputed colleges which are eponymous with these cities is enough testimony of the disconnect between these colleges and their host regions.

Unfortunately the Nehruvian thinking (which was based on flimsy ground even in his time) continues to this day. Rather than upgrade the dozens of universities churning out graduates in assembly-line fashion, all the government can think of is opening new IITs and IIMs , with a few hundred seats in each and making them islands of pseudo-excellence whose inhabitants consider themselves above the petty issues involving the local masses. As with all other things in politics one doesn’t need any research, feasibility study or cost-benefit analysis to come to any conclusion. What matters is whether the conclusion will attract headline space and generate sound bytes in the media.

What surprises me even more is how at the drop of a hat the government announces opening up of new IITs and IIMs while there’s not a word on creating new medical colleges. Medical education is not just about churning out new doctors. One government medical college gives free treatment to hundreds of thousands of poor patients in a year. It improves the entire health setup of the region by training nurses and other para-medical staff. Due to the huge scarcity of seats , MBBS grads are wasting precious years studying for post-graduate entrance exam while they could be out treating patients.

So there it was, my rather cynical take on the IIT-IIM hoopla. The usual disclaimers apply. I’m writing for my blog and not for IPCC report on climate change. So my research has been limited and counter-data can be easily used to dump my arguments. Not every IIT/IIM student is unaware of one’s surroundings and not all of them do local projects mainly to get one additional line on their resume. The profs are superb and very much involved in local issues. Finally we’re all sometimes prone to wearing our pride on our sleeves which can backfire as the following story of my hostel-mate illustrates. In his summer internship travelling across the dust-bowl of UP in an auto rickshaw , he proudly tells the auto driver that he’s from IIM. The auto driver replies “Oh good! But you guys only get a diploma. I’m considering a guy for my daughter who’s got a proper DEGREE in biotech. Degree is after all better than diploma” :)