"What Do You Study, IIM or MBA?" - Journey From A Village To IIM

"What do you study, IIM or MBA?" - Not a usual question asked by your father. But it happened to me, and I had to explain the difference. When you hail from a remote village, it's normal. Let me take you through the anecdote.

My educational journey began in a school that had only one classroom for all grades. It has taken me to many desirable stops—getting admission to prestigious IIM Nagpur has been and will remain one of my most palatable experiences in life. It has helped break many stereotypes around me as I have tangible proof in my hand.

I appeared for CAT 2019 along with other admission tests. The preparation part was quite simple: A typical day would start with a newspaper, then practising mocks & analysis, and at the end of the day few Sudoku & Kakuro rounds. The performance graph wasn't horizontal (y-axis- scores & other objective parameters VS time on X-axis), I kept going on without losing calm, and it paid off. The most exciting change from that period was - being consistent with the rituals; as Po said in Kung Fu Panda: there is no secret ingredient; it’s you. My strength was QA, so I focused more on the other two sections. Prepare with the mindset that you're the worst and perform like you're the best. The period between the exam and results was crucial to prepare for GDPI/GEPI process. When the scorecards were released, I got satisfactory results, and hence multiple GEPI mails piled up in the Inbox. The black swan was waiting next in the queue: The pandemic situation and the online interview started for many of them.  In the end, I cleared the final phase (interview round) of multiple colleges.

The day admission offer from IIM Nagpur showed up, my happiness transcended the atmosphere & reached outer space; that offer was the panacea to everything I was going through before that. I quickly shared the joy with my parents & colleagues. The initial two weeks were allocated to orientations, course sessions, and inductions for clubs & committees; in the pandemic, all of the activities were carried out online. This is one of the precious experiences, and even without being at a campus, students have bonded well. The MBA life is identical to what I had expected; late-night tasks, working in groups with crème de la crème, workshops & guest sessions, simulations, academic and non-academic activities, but the only part unexpected was the online medium. One more component is that time passes rapidly when you are an MBA student, so relish the golden moments spent while you’re in the program. The second term has already ended for our batch, and I am looking forward to the third sprint (as I mentioned, time progresses very quickly).

About the Author: Ashish Patel is a PGP 2020-22 student with experience in the biomedical sector. He has avocation towards making pencil portraits, calligraphy, and reading science fiction.