Indian Institute of Management Rohtak inducted the 13th batch of its flagship Post-Graduate Programme. The Orientation programme spread over three days, beginning on the 9th of July, 2022. The new batch was fortunate to be inducted in the presence of eminent speakers such as Shri Girish Chandra Murmu, Hon’ble Comptroller and Auditor General of India, Dr. SatyaPal Singh, Hon’ble Member of Parliament, Shri Rajesh Khullar, Executive Director, World Bank, and Shri Narendra Singru, Country Director, Asia Development Bank on the first day of Orientation Programme.
Director IIM Rohtak, Prof. Dheeraj Sharma, welcomed and congratulated the 13th batch of PGP as they embarked on a new journey and pursued a path toward becoming future leaders. He encouraged the students to start the new journey on a positive note. Students must engage in various projects, simulation games, and other co-curricular activities during the next two years to make themselves industry-ready. He further added, “Today, IIM Rohtak is the largest IIM in the country with an astounding and astonishing record of research. We are the first IIM to introduce a course on ‘Indian Knowledge System’ in the core curriculum that will expose the students with the concepts of Indian Culture and history. It will bring the participants closer to their cultural ethos, while expanding their intellectual horizons. IIM Rohtak is also starting a rural Immersion Program that will allow students to spend a week in the rural households closely observing the lives of the people that will help them develop an understanding of the economy of India.”
In his address to the new batch of 351 students in the PGP programme, Hon’ble Chief Guest, Shri Murmu, advised the students to focus on integrity, accountability, and transparency, as these are the cornerstone of any venture or profession. He urged that no matter where management students work in the future, they should consider the country's needs and think of how their work, innovations, and contribution could help fellow Indians. He added, "You are tomorrow’s business leaders and will play a major role in corporate governance, inclusive growth, and development of the economy. It becomes your responsibility to use your skill, talent, and capability to identify and create strategies and projects that will have an impact on the urgent social, psychological and ecological problems and make a positive contribution towards shaping an inclusive society.” Quoting Swami Vivekananda’s teachings, he said, “This is the time to decide your future. While you possess the energy of youth, not when you are worn out and jaded, but in the freshness and vigour of youth."
Dr. Satyapal Singh congratulated IIM Rohtak for its exceptional work over the past several years and for adding new and unique programmes like BBA+LLB (IPL), ePGDSM (Exec. Post Graduate Diploma in Sports Management), and BBA+MBA (IPM) to the institute’s portfolio. He congratulated the students for realizing their dreams and joining IIM Rohtak. He added that IIM Rohtak aims to produce scholars, managers, and policy makers of national importance. He advised the students, “To become successful, one should never cease to be a student in life, breath and practice every day to walk out as a successful manager and shining policy maker, and finally, live in the present and be happy in life.”
Shri Rajesh Khullar began his address with an Urdu poem, ‘Wo log bahut khush qismat the’ by Faiz Ahmed Faiz to sum up the biography of every human being who is currently alive on earth, whoever was alive on earth or who shall ever get to live on earth after now. He added, “May you all soon discover what your passion in life is and identify what it is that you would like to accomplish in 20 years from now. It helps one to identify the purpose of their life.” While quoting the book, Homo Sapiens, he described, “No matter what the technological progress political progress, or economic progress is, the fact is human life is suffering; and eventually, one has to figure out how to go beyond the suffering while being alive and find an overlap between your work and passion to suffer less”
Shri Narendra Singru advised the students to absorb knowledge and use it to create new ideas. He reinforced that analytical thinking triggers the entrepreneur inside you. He added, “Any recruiting organization wants to know whether you are suitable to do the work they want. Hence, what the organsation is looking for is the key to ensuring a successful application for a job role.”
Day 2 of the induction program also included panel discussions on the topic ‘Development and Progress in the VUCA World’. Featuring in these discussions were Shri Sanjay Kumar, Secretary, Youth Affairs, Govt. of India, Lt. Gen. Sukhdeep Sangwan, PVSM, AVSM, SM (Retd.), Maj. Gen. Rajendra Sachdev, Additional Director General, Opns Logistics, Indian Army, Shri Sandeep Girotra, President and Group CHRO, DCM Shriram, Shri Srikanth Srinivasan, AVP and Group Head, Wipro Ltd, and Ms. Shraddha Pradhan, Vice President, ICICI Lombard, among others.
Shri Sanjay Kumar stated that the modern day’s acronym ‘VUCA’ has characterized the world ever since the beginning of civilization. However, unlike in the past, a deep understanding of human behavior's volatility, complexity, ambiguity, and uncertinity has almost become indispensable today. Lt. Gen. Sukhdeep Sangwan, while advising the students on leadership aspects of VUCA said that a successful manager is one who explores the un-explored area and aligns her own interest with the perception of the team. One must keep their personal ambition aside and must lead the team with an example. While referring to the COVID situation, Maj. Gen. Rajendra Sachdev mentioned that ambiguity is the predominant element in the VUCA matrix. It led to major changes and challenges in operation preparedness and forced preservation to provide aid to civil society during the COVID-19 outbreak. Mr. Sandeep Girotra said that in a VUCA world, leaders need to innovate and change things, which may sometimes result in making a mistake. He advised the students that committing a mistake is fine as long as the same mistake is not repeated twice. People who commit mistakes are the ones who are trying. Shri Srikanth Srinivasan talked about the uncertainties in the VUCA situation and how one can fight such complex situations as an individual.
Continuing its legacy of the past several years, IIM Rohtak continued its focus on maintaining excellent gender and academic diversity amongst the students. Over 60% of students of the newly inducted batch are female students. This is in continuation of the historic gender diversity achieved by the institute in the last four years. The majority of the batch is of the age group 21 – 25 years, with a diverse representation from 25 states, which reflects a healthy combination from all parts of the country. There is also an excellent mix of academic diversity in the batch with students from Engineering, Commerce, Economics, Management, Humanities, and applied sciences backgrounds. About 25% of the batch has held previous work experience. Institute has been able to present the diversified batch consecutively for several years with the help of various outreach programmes conducted by the institute. IIM Rohtak is proud of its achievement of attaining 100% placements consecutively for five years now. Even during the COVID situation, the institute has placed the students well with an average salary of 15.92 LPA (higher by 16%) and the highest salary of 32 LPA (40% higher than the previous year).The institute faculty have been constantly producing consulting and research oriented results. Institute is involved in several important public policy research projects with various government bodies such as the Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of Consumer Affairs, among others.
Day three of the induction and orientation programme shall have the presence of eminent speakers like Shri Ronnie Screwvala, Chairman & Co-Founder Upgrad, and Shri Indresh Kumar Ji, a prominent social thinker.
IIM Rohtak is now a well-established and well-respected brand in academia and industry. One of the top management institutes in the country, it is the only IIM in the Delhi-NCR region. IIM Rohtak has become a benchmark of management education in India and aims to build the leaders of tomorrow by imparting knowledge with a unique cross-functional perspective.