Professor Bakul Dholakia took over the reins of Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad, the top B-school in the country, in October 2002. He is due to retire this year after a career in teaching spanning 37 years.
“I consider this award not as a recognition of my personal achievements, but recognition to the IIM family as a whole,” he said. “We have charted a course for IIM-A to put it in league with Ivy League business schools. We are focussing on implementing the OBC quota, a massive project which requires huge infrastructure.”
In last few years IIMs have been under a spotlight for a variety of reasons. Says Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad news release, “Bakul Dholakia took over the reins of Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad, in one of its most turbulent periods. First, former HRD minister M M Joshi tried to cut down IIM-A’s fee structure and then the NDA government imposed OBC reservations.”
Dholakia is credited to have pioneered the introduction of a one-year MBA programme at IIM-A, which is now being replicated in other IIMs. He said, “The challenges ahead for Indian managers in a globalised world is to mould Indian products and services to international standards and build ‘Brand India’.”
