“Government should create more opportunities for students in the country by opening at least one IIM in each state,” the committee’s report said.
This recommendation has sparked off a big debate. Can the current management education infrastructure -- particularly in the area of qualified faculty -- be ramped up to accommodate so many more IIMs? Will Brand IIM retain its appeal when so many new ‘extensions’ come into the market?
Of course no one is arguing against setting up of more educational institutes per se. Both industry leaders and management experts agree that the requirement of trained quality manpower far outstrips the current supply from top-tier institutes like IIMs. Sunil Kant Munjal, MD Hero Corporate Services Limited, while addressing B-school directors at the Association of Indian Management Schools (AIMS) convention at IIM Lucknow, had said, “IIMs need to expand dramatically. We often talk of IIMs as centers of excellence, which they are. But then how many such centers do we have? Six! Is that sufficient? Can we think of having 50 IIMs?”
Experts are, however, wary of how quickly this scaling up can happen. The biggest constraint is the availability of faculty. Speaking to MBAUniverse.com, IIM Bangalore director Prof P G Apte said, “To set up an IIM in each state is a very tough task. Faculty remains the biggest challenge. Quality faculty needs a social ecosystem like education and infrastructure to stay on a remote campus.”
Dr SP Parashar, director, IIM Indore, believes that while the proposal is a good idea, the implementation is critical. “I think the government’s idea of setting up IIMs in other states is a good idea, provided they can implement it well,” he said.
How does will this massive expansion impact the IIM Brand? Experts are of the opinion that Brand IIM can get diluted with such unbridled expansion. Management commentator SL Rao in his book on management developments titled From Servants To Masters, make this point emphatically: “…it’s time that the names IIT and IIM are copyrighted. Any demand for a new IIT or IIM by a state government should be met by the nearest IIT or IIM being asked to help establish one. The use of the name must be allowed only when it reaches the laid-out standards.”
Other experts argue that the government should, like in engineering education, first set up a National Institute of Management and only when they perform and meet the required criteria should they be promoted to the coveted IIM brand.
The other question is that of funding. Only three of the six IIMs are self-funded today. The committee has recommended that the government chalk out a plan, in consultation with IIMs, to ensure that over a period of time the IIMs become self-supporting and not depend on government funds. It noted that, at present, IIMs at Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Kolkata were generating their own resources while the government was providing financial assistance to IIMs in Indore, Lucknow and Kozhikode.
Mr S Kala, convener and treasurer of IIM Alumni body Pan-IIM, told MBAUniverse.com: “Yes, the country needs more quality management institutions. However, can the government adequately fund and support these new institutions? That is the question to be asked.”
