The placement week for the Institute of Rural Management Anand (IRMA) was scheduled during February 22-28, 2016. Placements at the Institute for the graduating batch of its flagship programme, Post Graduate Diploma in Rural Management (PGDRM), has been completed.
Over 350 jobs offers were received from about 100 recruiters for the batch. While 12 participants accepted the pre-placement offers made to them during their internship phase, two were sponsored candidates and five opted out of the placement programme this year.
The largest number of jobs offered by a single company was by the Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), a total of 18, as it did last year as well. Cooperatives / Producers Collectives as a sector offered jobs to one-fourth of the batch.
The other single largest recruiter this year was HDFC Bank in the agrifinance-microfinance sector with 11 selections. This was followed by ICICI-Lombard and National Payments Corporation of India, taking 10 and 9 students respectively. Like placements' in 2015, the amplified emphasis on financial inclusion and revival of the Micro Finance sector continued to reflect in the placements at IRMA with Agri-finance and Microfinance sector emerging as the biggest recruiters with about 1/3rd of the graduating batch joining the sector.
Interest in Social entrepreneurship sector continued to increase amongst the graduating batch with six of them recruiting 14 participants. A total of 25 students chose to take up offers made by Non-Government Development Organizations and Government Development Organizations. These included organizations such as Aga Khan Rural Support Programme, PRADAN, Gramin Shiksha Kendra. Arghyam is a new entrant to the list. Among the Government Development organizations/missions, Rajasthan Grameen Ajeevika Parishad, which recruited last year, was joined by Madhya Pradesh State Rural Livelihoods Mission as well as the Bihar Rural Livelihoods Promotion Society and Society for Elimination of Rural Poverty (SERP) Andhra Pradesh.
The average salary of the current batch was over Rs.8.5 lakhs per annum, and the maximum salary for the batch stood at Rs. 27.4 lakhs per annum. Median salary was Rs.8.2 Lakh per annum. As always, IRMA continues to turn out students who choose to work with Non-Government and Government Development Organizations where they give priority to serving one's calling rather than tangible monetary gains.
