Last year, the CSR team collected Rs 65,000 from the auction, but this year a whooping Rs. 90,000 was collected within 2 hours!
Faculty of Management Studies (FMS), understanding the need to inculcate the spirit of working for the society in budding managers, organised 'Silet Auction', a unique event wherein the students of the flagship MBA program offer items for sale and other students bid for them. The entire proceeds of the sale are donated to various NGOs, according to the FMS.
An FMS communique said, "Last year, the amount collected was Rs 65,000, which was used to get three visually impaired children operated, enabling them to see again. This year, the bar has been raised, as Team Vihaan collected a whooping Rs. 90,000 within 2 hours. The event saw a host of innovative items being put up on sale, showing the creative side of the FMS students."
Divyanshu Dikshit, President of Social Service Cell, FMS, said, “The event is an opportunity for us to put in a small contribution here to make a much bigger difference somewhere else. It’s all about opportunity and how we can create one instead of waiting for it to come to us.” For the new batch of 2009-2011, it was their first experience with the Silent Auction. Sabyasachi Ghosh, a second year MBA student at FMS, said, "The silent auction serves as a perfect ice breaker between the two batches, as this was the first informal event after the hectic induction fortnight. This was a perfect platform to boost camaraderie and long-lasting friendships within the FMS fraternity with an increasing number of dates and mountaineering expedition on offer. It was very exciting to see 250 bright individuals battling each other in an attempt to outbid one another, all for the benefit of the society at large."
Shashi Shekhar, a first year student at FMS, said, “We not only contributed to a cause as special as this one, but did it in a special way." If previously, outings with seniors were the most sought after , this year saw items like finance lectures, homemade Kannada food, mountaineering trips, guitar lessons, road trips etc ruling the auction boards. An amazing 325 items were put up for bidding! The single item that raised the highest amount this year was Finance/Economics/Accounting classes by Nidhi Kaicker and Vidhi Srivastava, which was sold for Rs. 10,000. Shashi Shekhar and Siddhesh Agashe were the highest individual entries who put in Rs 2,500 and Rs 1,600 respectively.
"The auction not only brought forward innovative ideas of the budding managers of FMS but also reinforced the fact that the youth of today is socially responsible," a spokesperson from FMS said.
