30/03/2015

30/03/201; 15:55:

It’s been a busy weekend, with the PGP convocation and all!
27th morning began with the field trip to Unique Hospital where we were taken around the hospital- the Operation Theatre, the ICU, the general ward, the special wards and more. Once back, we walked down to the HRC to get ourselves some work which we very much did!
I was up at 7 a.m. on Saturday, 28th March i.e. Convocation Day. This, after sleeping only at 4:30 a.m., since work had been in progress.
5 IPM girls were to be dressed up in Indian or Western formals, to be ushers at the Convocation. This year, the Convocation was to happen at Brilliant Convention Centre. It’s a rather sophisticated place, with a couple of large halls and even outdoor space to hold events. So, there we were, at work, early in the morning; the ladies were all being decked up in sarees that were carefully draped. They set off for BCC at around 8:30. Soon after, the PGP/FPM/EPGP participants all took off for the venue.
At 9 a.m., I walked down to the MDC (that’s where all important people who’re on campus stay) to spend some time with Mr. Vinay Kamath of BusinessLine (The Hindu) fame. We spoke about the 5-year IPM Programme, their idea of launching a portal directed specifically at B-School students and more.

At 10:30, around 40 volunteers were to make their way to the venue, to help with robing the graduating students. I supervised as the kids got into 3 different buses, all excited, for the venue promised to have excellent food on offer.
Soon after, around 11:30, we met with the Transport Department. 26 buses had been arranged (the same ones which carted all the graduating students to the venue earlier in the morning) to transport almost 1200 parents who were staying on campus to BCC. By 1 p.m., most parents were on way to the venue, thanks to an efficient team that got people on the buses and the buses moving on time.

28th Night was a little relaxed- not too many people were moving in and out of campus; we sat at the HRC playing Monopoly and trying to get people to bet on the World Cup Final.
After morning class on 29th i.e. Sunday, we once again parked ourselves at the HRC. Later in the night, we walked around all the now-nearly empty hostel blocks, opening each door and getting out all the extra mattress and pillows that had been put in there for the guests.
We got back by 5 a.m., having gotten most of the mattresses out and collected.

We’ve had a few classes today; lined up is D’Battle- the British Parliamentary Debate & the MUN at 6:30p.m., today!
The SAC-T and SAC-C candidates have been hard at work, with the Convocation. We shall soon get to the interview stages for both processes.

27/03/2015

25/03/15; 23:45:

Monday - classes; PR; Zephyr session; Chiraag meeting, media comm. Meeting; atharv coordinator voting; result;
Tuesday- Classes; city; mani-pedi; food- sac-c briefing; resume/sop
Wed- Classes; zephyr; volleyball; sac-c task2; task 3 begins.
26/03/15; 07:37:

I’d just about settled down to write, sometime around 11 p.m., when I decided to make a phone call to Oshin, to check on the progress of the meeting that had been called at 10:15 p.m. Work was very much in progress and I made my way down towards it; I got to my hostel just about now.

Let’s get to where we left off. Monday began with our McDonalds presentation which left everyone hungry but happy. At 5 ‘o clock in the evening, we had our first session of ‘Public Relations’.
This was followed by the very first meeting of Zephyr- our Psychological Well-Being circle. This session was mainly an ice-breaker; we tried to understand everyone’s interests and their reasons for being inclined towards delving into the mysterious depths of psychology. Right after this ended, there was a Chiraag meeting to participate in- we discussed new ideas and more!
There was time enough just for a quick dinner before a Media Comm meeting was in order. I’d tried to be all formal, announcing the meeting over e-mail and changing the venue from our usual table in Mess 2 to an actual classroom in the Academic Block. This meeting was very different from most others. I stood there, facing all my team members (we’re usually just seated around a table!); everyone was asked to identify the hierarchy followed by power structure in our Committee- everyone agreed that it was simply a circle- everyone was equal. Sheets were then handed out to each member. They were all asked to write down what they’ve done, what they’ve learnt, what they could have done better, what they wished they’d have done, what the feel, what their take-away will be and more, after dedicating a good part of their academic year to working as part of the Media & PR Committee. I myself sat writing; everyone was done writing in about half an hour post which a couple of members tried to ‘submit’ their sheets to me- of course, I did not even look at any of them for they were for their author’s eyes only. I then proceeded to share everything that I’d written down ranging from how I should have learnt more from my team & how I should make my decision-making less emotional to how we’d successfully worked as a team & what I liked best about/ learnt from each member. The floor was then open to everyone- people shared their highs, their lows, their learning and more. It was a very fruitful discussion and a very enjoyable one at that too! We had to wrap up the session since it was almost 11 p.m.

The final list of candidates who’d made it to the final election stage as part of the selection process for the Atharv ’15 coordinator was sent out at around 8:30 p.m. All students of the 2013 & 2014 batches were required to make their way to the SR-17 Common room, post 11 p.m. and cast their votes. So, that’s right where I headed. I sat around, manning one of the voting machines (which was essentially a laptop running a program on Excel). The voting ended close to 1 a.m. Of course, everyone was rather anxious to know the result- most of all the hopefuls! The results were sent out around 3 a.m., to save the final 5 a sleepless night. Harish & Shashank are now the Coordinators for Atharv ’15. Here’s hoping for a hugely successful fest!
I was later on the phone, talking to one of the unsuccessful candidates, trying to get him to feel better. Tuesday morning began with a PR class. At 1:15 p.m., a briefing session for all the SAC-C and SAC-T applicants was called- they were informed about the duties & responsibilities that being SAC-C/T entails. Also, they were told to be prepared for a rigorous pre-process that would get them there!
Soon after the meeting, an e-mail was sent out, detailing the first pre-process. It was the standard SoP & Résumé- they had to be sent in by 7 p.m., the same evening. The next task involved scrutinizing the IPM SAC Constitution- suggesting changes, comparing it with the Constitution of the Student Body of another B-School and the PGP SAC Constitution and more. This was to be sent in by 2200 hours on the 25th.
We headed out to visit ‘Fingertips- The Nail Spa’ in Indore city, for we had a voucher worth Rs. 5000 to redeem. All three of us got manicures & pedicures. This was a novel experience for me- of course, I was aware of these procedures but had never actually experienced one. It was rather oaky and as I’d envisaged rather weird to have someone handle your feet. My nails are all red & pretty, so, that’s an upside. Cheesecake and ‘not-on-the-menu-but-prepared-specially-for-me’ honey chilly potatoes later, we were on our way back to campus.
Meanwhile a meeting had been called at 8:30 p.m. to brief the SAC-C hopefuls about their next task which was to manage to PGP Convocation- working hard on hospitality and logistics on the 26th & the 27th of March. Also, I managed to find a partner (or he managed to find me!) for the British Parliamentary Debate being conducted as part of D’Battle.

Wednesday saw a few classes, till about 5 p.m. We also managed to have a surprise quiz in our Game Theory class. Sir wrote a problem on the board; we got to solving it when the IPM Office people suddenly burst into the classroom bearing blank sheets. Said problem was then to be solved on the sheet and submitted.
After class, I made my way to Xpress-o-mat to pick up my clean clothes. At 6:30 we had a Zephyr session- we discussed dreams. The session began with everyone spelling out the one value that is at the centre of their being, their one fundamental value and sharing a little incident or two that highlights the same. A little thinking later, I decided that my core value is Love- that is the most important thing to me and lies at the centre of all my dealings- Love that is manifested as happiness.
Soon after, I was on the terrace of the Academic Building, looking up at the constellations in the night sky. I’d found myself a willing guide- he pointed out constellations, Jupiter, Sirius and gave out random interesting facts.
I managed to play some volleyball before returning to my room. Post this, I made the aforementioned phone call to Oshin and found myself at the HRC, doing a whole lot of work. This included going to multiple hostel blocks, opening rooms and laying out mattresses and pillows as per the requirement list. The PGP Convocation is on the 28th and hence all the 450 PGP participants, some PGP-UAE participants, some PGP-Mumbai participants and even a few FPM participants along with their families shall be on campus. I was out working till about 7:30 a.m. before retiring to my room to get some much needed rest.

27/03/15; 01:58:

And, I’d been writing for sometime before I decided to catch some sleep, for I had plans for later in the day.
I woke up around 1 p.m., having gotten a few hours of sleep. As previously planned, we got ourselves on the 2 p.m. bus. Our Media & PR committee was to have a lunch together. We spent over 3 hours, talking over lots of food and even more Thums Up, at Chawla’s.
Once back, I headed straight to the HRC to get even more work done. About half the PGP participants are already on campus; the rest should get here by 27th evening. A very efficient system has been devised to keep track of all the required mattresses, the security deposit, the guest rooms and more.
At about 9:30 in the morning, we shall leave for our ‘field trip’ to Unique hospital- courtesy our course titled ‘Introduction to Medicine’.

23/03/2015

23/05/2015; 00:00:

Gudi Padwa (Marathi New Year; the same day is celebrated under different names in various parts of the country- including Ugadi (Andhra Pradesh), Cheti Chand (Sindhi New Year), Navroz (Parsi) and the beginning of the Navratras) morning was spent cleaning up my room; we had a presentation in the afternoon which was rather okay; we went out for dinner in the evening, to celebrate the beginning of the New Year.
Later in the night, we had a Lady-members-only SAC EC meeting in the hostel.

I transported my dirty clothes to the newly started Xpress-o-mat, earlier this evening. We’ve since been working on our presentation for our course on ‘Introduction to Business History’; it shall be presented in class, early on Monday morning. Our topic deals with McDonalds’ success as a global brand, with emphasis on the franchise business model.

A lot of announcements have been made, over e-mail of course. Zephyr, our new initiative shall see its first session on the evening of Monday, 23rd March at 6:15 p.m.
Retorica has announced its much-awaited event- D’Battle- it shall include, over three evenings an MUN and a British Parliamentary Debate.
The Music Club has begun an initiative that they’re calling ‘Practice Groups’- it’s essentially a platform for all like-minded musicians to get together and jam!
The elections for Atharv-Coordinator shall be held later on Monday evening. All students of the 2013 & 2014 batches shall vote. The final list of applicants who’ve survived 3 rounds of pre-process shall be made public, right before the actual voting.

And, we have an order of Chicken Lollipops sitting on our bed, courtesy the night mess. My friend here demands that I join her, since eating alone makes her feel like a ‘bhukad’. I shall be off!

21/03/2015

21/03/15; 06:57:

It’s Gudi Padwa. I remember, a while back, when it was around Pongal I suppose, we had made a series of plans to have a grand celebration for Gudi Padwa (Marathi New Year) & Ugadi (Telgu New Year) which happen to be on the same date. Let’s hope something eventful happens, today.

So, Thursday aka Sunday, here at the Integrated Programme in Management, at IIM-Indore, was supposed to be all eventful, but ended up being mainly a sleep fiesta. I woke up only around mid-day ( I woke up to the news of being selected for the internship at Sankalp- the one that I’d really wanted- so, that was off to a great start!); i-Help operations carried on as usual; once up, we decided to get working on our Social Media Assignment. We’d picked StumbleUpon as our topic of choice. StumbleUpon is a rather unique way to browse the internet. You sign up, pick a bunch of interests, from an almost limitless list of topics; you hit the ‘Stumble’ button and you’re off! It lands you on WebPages that cater to your tastes! You can choose to bookmark, share, mark up or mark down the pages that you are directed to. We decided to create a ‘real-world’ version of StumbleUpon. A list of topics was drawn up on a whiteboard. I ‘clicked’ one, Nature. I was then thrown in front of a pretty tree! We thus spent the afternoon recording such clips- me stumbling into a bookshelf in the library & being awed by the collection of books (Books), me rolling into the frame and falling asleep under a tree (Nature), me walking straight into a series of cycles (Fitness), me cycling into Mess 2 and staring at the food on offer (Food!), me having a series of handbags dropped on my head (Fashion) and more! I then headed back to my room and promptly fell asleep again. We wound up the loose ends of the video, later in the evening. I then spent an hour camping in the Pi-Shop.

Friday saw a flurry of classes till about 5 in the evening. I then made and received a few calls to/from the media, letting them know about the play that was to happen later in the evening. At 6:30, we made our way (post eating evening snacks, of course) to the New Auditorium, where a bunch of enthusiastic students were staging Oscar Wilde’s ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’. The play was directed & produced by Dr. Shweta Kushal, our professor, in the Communications Department. The play was beautifully executed- the three months of work that had gone into it was clearly visible- everything from the dialogue delivery to the stage and the assignment of roles was perfect. Unfortunately, I had to miss the last bit of the play, in order to get the press release out on time.

At 9:30, I made my way to the FPM Common Room for a rather grave SAC-EC meeting. The meeting went on for nearly three hours, post which I made my way to the SR-17 Common Room. The interviews for selection of the Atharv ’15 coordinators were to be conducted, from 11 p.m. till about 2 a.m. This was to be the final round- the last people standing shall make it to the election where the students of the 2013 & 2014 batches shall pick their leaders. We missed only one interview- clearly, we were off schedule! The 14 interviews went on nearly all night, ending only close to 6 a.m. We finally had the shortlist down to 6 candidates! The election shall most possibly be held on Sunday! Here’s hoping for a grand-er Atharv 2015!

18/03/2015

18/03/15; 23:00:

It’s been an almost long day, with 5 classes, starting right at 8:45 this morning.

Late on Saturday night, an e-mail was sent out to all those who made it to Round-2 of the Atharv Coordinator selections. The e-mail was sent out at around 1 a.m. The applicants were all to send in their résumés and Statements of Purpose by 6 a.m. i.e. in a few hours, in the middle of the night! They were then asked to report to the SR-17 Common Room at 7 a.m.! On reporting thus, the 20 candidates, who had successfully made it past the first round, were asked to organize into pairs for the next task. They were all to prepare an Action Plan for Atharv 2015!

On the night of 16th March, students of all three batches were invited to be part of Round-2 of the selection process. Each duo was to present their Action Plan to an auditorium full of IPM students, with the Core Committee of Atharv ’14 all perched on the first row, looking on, scrutinizing their every move. The well, event began by 9:30 p.m.; we were all there by 9 p.m., hurriedly deciding the criteria on which the hopefuls were to be marked. The presentations encompassed details of all the different verticals that would be needed to conduct the fest – Marketing, Sponsorship, Hospitality, Events, Informals, Events Coverage, Creatives, Logistics, Participation, Finance, Operations and more; the Pi Quiz, detailed time-lines of the months leading up to the fest; problems encountered during Atharv ’14 and their solutions and more. Everyone shot questions to the mostly patient, composed candidates.
The whole thing went on till a little after 1 a.m. post which everyone returned to their rooms.
I capered about the hostel, putting in flyers at each door- flyers that would let everyone know that Zephyr – that’s what our Psychological Well Being Circle shall be called- is all set to begin!

On Tuesday, the newly opened Laundromat announced its decision to now stay open 24 hours! They’re doing good business, what with people wanting to supervise their own laundry washing!
Meanwhile, the Pi Shop is all set to organize Polythene Reuse Campaign; everyone is encouraged to deposit their used polythene bags at designated collection points – these shall be reused by the Pi Shop.
We heard from Greenpeace, sometime ago; pretty much everyone other than me got an offer letter from them. I felt a little bad; but, I soon learnt that Sankalp Foundation, Banglore- the place that I want to intern at- would be conducting interviews soon.


Today was rather eventful. We had 5 classes, right from 8:45 in the morning. As the pre-lunch session ended at 1 p.m., the IPM Office asked to see some of us; I then received the news that I had an interview with Sankalp lined up later that evening i.e. at 4 p.m. I was rather excited, for I rather like what Sankalp is doing on the whole making blood donation entirely voluntary front. My interview was conducted over the telephone, was about 15 minutes long and was very enjoyable. I was asked about the various points on my résumé including my role as Media Comm. Coordinator, my story of being the PR &Marketing Head for Atharv ’14 & Ranbhoomi ’15, my being co-founder of our educational initiative, i-Help and my project on Measuring & Analyzing the Multi-Dimensional Poverty Index at Ashraward Khurd, Madhya Pradesh. The internship involves a lot of travelling, which I am looking forward to; my sole apprehension is not being able to speak the local language i.e. Kannada. I hoping to hear from Sankalp soon, hoping to hear positive things at that too!

Later in the evening, Shruti & I spent time with Prarthana ma’am, working out the details of Zephyr and fixing a date & time for the first session. This was followed by a SAC EC meeting- the SAC Coordinator and Treasurer for the next academic year have to be picked; a set of pre-processes must be designed for the same. Later in the night, a form was sent out, asking for nominations. We cycled around campus and later got ourselves chilled milk at the Pi Shop.

The Dance Club has sent out e-mails, announcing a Merengue Workshop, sometime in April. I shall now find a partner, preferably the Dance Club Coordinator and sign myself up!

16/03/2015

14/03/2015; 14:33:

It’s been one interesting week! And, it’s now Saturday!
Thursday, which is supposed to be our ‘weekly off’, was by far the most hectic day of this week.

We have a course on ‘World Politics’, this term. The first class was held on Monday. The professor has done his PhD in China Studies, while living in China as a cultural exchange student! McDonalds was on campus, in the evening- with an array of burgers on offer. I think a weekly schedule has almost been fixed- some retailer or the other is on campus, on any given day of the week. I shall try and curate a consolidated list of this; it shall be one useful list. The Finance and Investment Club held the first session of their promised Financial Discussion Forum on Monday evening at around 7 p.m.- the session sought to throw light on the world of finance- no prior knowledge of finance or investment was necessary to benefit from the session. We then played Volleyball.
Our session schedules unfortunately would not allow us to participate in Spree- BITS Goa’s sports fest that was due to begin on 12th March. We thus spent Monday night making random phone calls, looking for an alternate sports fest to attend, on a later date.
10th March (Tuesday) was Rang Panchami- the 5th day after Holi. Rang Panchami is celebrated in a big way, in and around Indore; we however had a normal working day- replete with a Game Theory Quiz in addition to a few classes. Things like Game Theory and Nash Equilibrium feel like part of our daily lives, rather than like some abstract concepts that only some people know of, and, that’s awesome. Royal Sandwich was on campus, on Tuesday, with an array of sandwiches on offer. An assignment as part of the course on Social Media was to be submitted on Thursday. Tuesday night was thus spent typing out said assignment.
The IPM SAC meanwhile is trying to create a consolidated list of the achievements of the IPM students. Xpress-o-mat – the new student-driven laundry service began operations on Wednesday evening! Washing machines, dryers, laundry bags, detergents and more have been procured for the same- a room in SR-05 is now ‘Xpress-o-mat’. It looks rather useful- drop off your clothes- they shall be washed, dried and folded, all in a matter of 2 hours! We now have two laundry services on campus- the other, existing one is here, for now. Perhaps, they might choose to merge, at a later date. BKC foods was on campus, on Wednesday with fish fry, veg rolls and chicken popcorn on offer. I like their fish fry.
We spent some time with Prarthana Ma’am, the institute counsellor, working on a project that is a Psychological Well-Being Circle- from what I understand, it will be more of a psychology-related discussion forum than a well-being circle. We designed a flyer, in order to let everyone know of the idea. We set off to Indore city, to get the flyers printed, and managed to get back to campus without the flyers, but with full stomachs instead. We sat down later in the night, working on the aforementioned assignment. It rained almost all through the night!

12th March- Thursday began with our weekly trip to nearby government schools as part of the i-Help initiative. It was a nice cool morning, thanks to the rain; once back, a couple of us huddled together in my room, talking. The topic very soon turned to ghost stories. In the process of this discussion, it was revealed that the New Auditorium is haunted- multiple people have apparently heard a woman’s shrill yelling at various points in time.
I then had a Skype interview with Greenpeace. As part of the course curriculum, we are required to do a social internship at the end of the third year. The placement process for the social internships is thus in full swing. A couple of people have already received offer letters from various NGO’s and CSR-wings- some chose to select candidates entirely on the basis of their résumés, some asked for written pre-processes, still others shall do phone/Skype interviews. I remember seeing some PGP guys roaming around wearing a shirt-tie-blazer and boxer shorts- all of it makes sense now- Skype Interviews! My interview was rather short, 7-8 minutes at most-most other people had 20-25 minute interviews. We should hear from them in a while.
Later in the evening, there was a SAC-EC meeting- a meeting hadn’t been held in a while and there were a couple of things to be discussed- the most important being post-fest follow-up for Ranbhoomi. Low attendance in guest lectures was a topic of discussion. There’s also a proposal for an IIT – IIM FaceOff. We’re looking to having that soon!
Later in the night, at 11 p.m., to be precise, I made my way to the SR-17 common room. The selection procedure for the Atharv ’15 coordinators was due to begin soon! All the interested applicants were divided into 5 groups of roughly 7 members each. One group at a time made their way to the GD room, upstairs where Piyush & Pranav had a cleverly designed problem to drive a group-think! Meanwhile, we spoke to the other people, gauging their specific interests in the fest, their strengths, the flaws in Atharv ’14, the pros & the cons of everything and the expansion plans. This went on till about 3 a.m., post which we were back in the hostel.

16/03/2015; 00:17
Most of Saturday was spent in class; later in the evening, we had a very brief Media Comm. Meeting. Post the meeting, we spent some time with the PGP E-cell. They are planning an event in mid-August and needed a Media Team. The event aims to be a platform to allow for interaction between start-ups that need funding and venture capitalists who are looking for promising start-ups.
Most of Sunday was morning/afternoon and evening was spent sleeping! Looking forward to classes on Monday.. or not!

08/03/2015

08/03/2015; 23:20:


8th March, 2015 saw another first on the IIM-Indore campus. The IPM community, fueled by their passion for change, organized ‘Utkarsha’- the Social Fest. ‘Utkarsha ‘means to rise and that is exactly the sentiment that the fest hoped to capture. ‘To rise’, above it all, to rise, just enough to see beyond everything that is wrong, out over all the good that exists somewhere, within each human, to rise and reach beyond one’s own selfish interests, to rise above the petty few and reach for the grand that is it all, to rise, and move away and beyond the one that’s always been there, to reach out and discover that which could be and deserves to be, to rise, to the depths beyond and then, reach out to another you.
And, what better day to rise to, than International Women's Day!

The event began close to 9 a.m. The event took off with an address by AishwaryaMangla, the convener of the fest. This was followed by words of inspiration courtesy the IPM Chair, Dr Amitabh Kodwani. Ashwini followed this up with a presentation on the social initiatives undertaken by the IIM-Indore community. Mrs. SudhaKaul, the keynote speaker and guest of honour then took centre stage, speaking most necessarily of an inclusive and socially responsible society. She is a Padma Shree awardee and the founder of the Indian Institute of Cerebral Palsy. The architecture of an inclusive society is based on Democracy, Development, Diversity and Dialogue. Corporate Social Responsibility is the continuing commitment by business to behave ethically and contribute to economic development while improving the quality of life of the workforce and their families, as well as of the local community and society at large. We need, today, more than even before to ‘belong’ to the society that we live in.

The CSR-NGO conclave which took the form of a panel discussion withProf. SatyajitMajumdar (Profeesor , TISS) as the moderator began soon after. The panelists included Mr. Raghavendra K(VP, HR, Infosys BPO) , Dr. K KUpadhyay (CSR Head, FICCI Aditya Birla Center for Excellence); Mr. Bhoopendra Singh (Project Head, Reliance Foundation) ; Mr. Rajesh Tiwari(Founder, ICCSR); Mr. Syed Kazi (Deputy Director, Digital Empowerment Foundation); and Mr. ShubhranshuChoudhary (Founder, CGNetSwara). The topic under consideration was “Creating an enabling environment for Corporate- NGO partnerships in India; Tackling problems faced in forging strategic and long term Corporate – NGO ties”

The discussion opened with the question ‘ Why do corporates in India engage with non-business organizations such as NGO’s ?’ It then moved to ‘Do we see some conflict of interests while corporate association with NGO? Or is there convergence of values?’ This sparked off a healthy debate, among the panelists and also made participants raise questions. The two value systems are inherently the same- their roots may be different, but, even with two viewing angles to the same situation, their values remain the same. Corporates ought to focus on ‘talent development’ in a big way- The closing question wondered whether corporate engagements consider issues related to sustainable development. Corporates focus not only on ROI- return on investments, but also on ROI- return on imagination. The steps to sustainable development begin with feeding, teaching the person how to fish, and continue to hand-holding, to give the person confidence to keep the initiative going, by themselves. CSR helps not only in product differentiation but also in product innovation. There was the talk of reactive and creative stories in journalism and how similarly, CSR ought to be creative rather than merely reactive. Do not just pay the beggar; find out why the beggar exists in the first place- that sums up how society ought to react.

This was followed by a presentation by the trustee and students of Aasthagram Trust, Khargone. Mr. Wajid Khan with his unveiling of his ‘nail-art’ canvases and his story from being a simple village boy to one who is now a record-holder was up next. Mementos for all were provided by Archies& Twenty19.

Later in the day, there were stalls set up by various NGO’s, both to spread awareness and to display products that they create. A gramophone playing hit Bollywood numbers kept the atmosphere lively, through the warm afternoon. We managed to have a pani-puri eating contest, with the loser paying for the other’s food; I very happily enjoyed my free pani-puri.

A CSR-Modelling competition which is definitely the need of the hour, given the huge money involved, with proper channels not always being available to route this fund to the needy, was held, as was Avdhaarna- the Social B-Plan Competition. The CSR-Modelling Competition was won by SPJIMR College. Avdharna was won by SRCC, new Delhi and SCMHRD, Pune.

08/03/2015

08/03/2015; 06:45:

We’re about two hours away from the inaugural of ‘Utkarsha’- the first-ever IPM Social Fest.

The evening of 5th March was spent ushering in spring, with the festival of colours- Holika Dahan i.e. the burning of the fire on Holi happened at around 9 p.m., on the football ground. The event saw music, dancing and of course, it gave way to colours being smeared on everyone’s faces. I got to return to my room with a half red & a half pink face. Of course, not much effort went into cleaning up, for there was a lot more where that came from, all lined up for the next morning.

As decided by the Cultural Committee, Holi was to kick –off at 9 a.m. Of course, all the boys had planned and were there earlier, creating a large pool of muck, where people were to be dunked, all through the celebration. About a hundred kilos of gulaal had been arranged; there was music playing and there were colourful people everywhere. The celebration ended on a perfect note, with water being sprayed everywhere and samosas being served to all.
Later in the evening, we managed to get our hands on delicious gujjiya; our festival was now complete.
We headed out for lunch, on the 7th. At around 10 p.m., we began a run-through of the next morning’s programme.

And, 100 posts down!

05/03/2015

03/03/15; 23:45:

On the morning of 2nd March, right after the EDM night, we have two ECS classes in the morning. We indulged, as promised in a group discussion. The topic in question was ‘Is western culture affecting Indian Youth?’. Post lunch, we had a Game Theory class; we’ve been discussing Nash Equilibrium and the Pareto optimal, among other things. This was quickly followed by a class of ‘Introduction to Medicine’- this course is apparently an important part of our curriculum, so that, when we are managers in a company, and someone takes leave, citing medical reasons, we can try and figure out if they’re lying.
We then went off to collect our IGNOU books for the new academic year, since we had received an e-mail which very clearly threatened to throw all unclaimed books out by the end of the day. We overheard some PGP students discussing the EDM night, near the faculty mess; life’s good, people are talking about Ranbhoomi and in good light.
We then went to have a look at the CSI End Term papers. While we were in there, the rain that had begun to fall was intercepted by a warm sunlight. And, as we stepped out of the classroom and into the corridor, we were greeted by a rainbow, in all its glory- high and might, arced perfectly, each of the 7 strips of colour showing perfectly against the backdrop of the grey-blue sky, with just a whisk of white clouds in the corners of the frame. It was, and I dare not use any other words, for fear of being unable to capture that marvellous spectacle correctly, Perfect.

We then proceeded to walk aimlessly around campus for at least 4 hours. Oh, and, I managed to get some food at Globe @ I , the new Chinese place on campus. Also, the night mess has added a lot of new items to their menu, including Chicken 65 and Spring Rolls.

05/03/2015; 01:41:

Yesterday saw the first class of ‘Introduction to Business History’- the course began with the professor scribbling three questions on the blackboard even before he introduced himself. The course began, much to everyone’s delight, with a quiz. Reading material for the course had been given out a few days before, and, we’d been apparently expected to read through the first prescribed reading. The session itself was rather interesting; we discussed mainly the expectations that people had from the course and the indentured labour system.

I was then in the IPM Office at 5 p.m., getting information about the soon-to-be held Prize Distrubution session for the 2011 batch. I was to prepare and present a PowerPoint presentation on the Achievements of the IPM students. We then designed the content for a flyer that we intend to slip under everyone’s doors, soon. We’re all geared up to start ‘Zephyr’, the Psychological Wellness Circle, under the guidance of the institute counsellor, Ms. Prarthana Sharma. Late evening was spent playing Volleyball. The Pi shop held interviews to recruit new members from the 2013/2014 batches.

3 kids managed to get selected. I was at the Old Auditorium, at 9:15 a.m., as decided at my meeting with the IPM Office. We had a run-through of the Prize Distribution Ceremony which was scheduled to happen at 2 p.m. At this point, we suggested to our IPM chair and the IPM Office to include the menu for the High-Tea that was to follow the ceremony, in the e-mail inviting students to attend. A second session of ‘Introduction to Business History’ and some lunch later, we were all assembled in the Old Auditorium. The function surprisingly began right on time. My presentation began with stating the unique features of the IPM course, including the course curriculum, the exchange programme and the social internship. We then looked at achievements of the 2011 batch students; the events including Ranbhoomi, Utkarsha, Atharv, i-Help and the Khargone visits were highlighted; this was followed by brief mentions of victorious students, at various events including B-plan competitions, essay-writing contests, the Tata Crucible Quiz and in the field of sports. The presentation ended with a collage of assorted, randomly picked pictures of the IPM students in action.
Our Director Sir then spoke, praising the programme and talking of his relationship with the guest of honour, Mr. Luis Miranda. Mr. Miranda then spoke of taking on every opportunity that comes your way, rising up to meet challenges and never undermining the limitless scope of potential possibilities. Certificates of merit were then handed out to the top 5% students of the batch. The High-Tea that followed had good food on offer, including vegetable cutlets and vanilla ice-cream.

We then had one class; the next 4 days are now off. We headed out to Chappan for dinner, in order to welcome our 4-day impromptu break. Quite a few people have headed home; the others here are all in anticipation of the Holi celebration that is in store, on the 6th.

03/03/2015

03/03/15; 01:56:

Let’s start right where we left off. Later in the evening on the 27th, there was an IIT-Indore v/s IIM-Indore Basketball Match. Amity University beat IIM-Indore by a single point to win the Table Tennis event. The Basketball Match was very interesting. Even though by the time I got to the court, the game was well into its second half, each point sent the game this way or that. The game finally ended with a 39-40 score, in favour of IIM-Indore.
Meanwhile, ‘Amplifed’- the Music event had begun in the Central Lawn. All the food stalls- Apna Sweets selling IndiPizza & Ice-cream; Sarafa ka Parathewala with his paneer and sev paratha; Red Dragon had butter chicken, chilli paneer and more; Buddy’s Cafe was dishing out Chinese and milkshakes; Burger Planet stayed true to its name; and Meximus had a large variety of Mexican food on offer- were doing brisk business. Amplified consisted of a series of Musical events, ranging from ‘Tune In’ where the participant had to successfully identify the tune being played and subsequently sing the song in question to a Musical Face-Off! Prizes included boxes of Galaxy chocolates and cans of Red Bull.

The match must’ve ended close to 11 p.m.; soon after, I was back at the Central Lawn. On my way up to the Central Lawn, I met a couple of guys who wished to register for the Campus Roadies thing. It was good to see people interested in the event that was to be conducted by Roadies 5 winner, Ashutosh Kaushik on the 28th.Spotting an available sound system, a microphone, a waiting stage and all, I got talking. We began with looking for the person with the longest name. The winner refused to comply with our request for a rap and we then had to begin a new search. We then had on stage 2 guys in pink T-shirts. They were both Cricket players. We decided to pick the winner via a Cricket-specific sports quiz. Agrim volunteered to ask questions. After both of them failed to get any answers right, a Tug-of-War was suggested. A round of push-ups was then held to determine the winner. By this time, a large crowd had assembled around the stage and a couple more one-on-one push-up challenges followed. A few rounds of tug-of-war soon followed. I managed to be on the winning side, most times. Sensing a lull in the excitement, I got back on stage, to get the party going, since everyone had by now had multiple tries at a tug-of-war. I called to the crowd for random entertainment ideas. No one understood quite how or why, but, there was soon a stripping contest going on, with random guys getting on stage, getting their shirts off and showing off to the crowd. By around 1 a.m., most people had decided to go catch some sleep, since a lot of them had early morning matches.

Most teams were rather happy with the sports facilities extended; what with the newly constructed cricket ground, the indoor wooden Badminton court, the green and red basketball court, the newly done-over Volleyball courts and the sports equipment(courtesy Mahavir Sports).

I walked around for a bit, talking to newly found company. 28th morning saw Volleyball matches – they were mostly happening in the early mornings, for the overhead sun would not allow the ball to be properly visible. The Swimming event began at 9 a.m. and ran till lunch-time. The Swimming events were: 50m & 100m Freestyle, 50 & 100m Breast Stroke, 50 & 100 m Back Stroke and 50m Butterfly - for both men and women. Cricket matches went on till afternoon, post which they had to be abandoned thanks to the sudden rain. It just has to rain when we’re having a fest! It had rained during Atharv and even now, when it was almost March, the rain had to make an appearance. Post lunch, the media and Ashutosh Kaushik were on campus. The power-lifting event was in progress, since late-morning. A short interview of the Roadies 5 winner and some cold coffee later, the media persons decided to leave, since the arm-wrestling event did not appear to be ready to begin, any time soon.

A couple of events had been planned for the evening of 28th Feb, since all of 1st evening was to be the VH1 Supersonic EDM night. The arm-wrestling event began a few hours after its scheduled time, upsetting the schedule of all the other events. After the Women’s Arm-Wrestling and the Men’s Arm-Wrestling over 4 different categories, ‘Footloose’- the Dance event attempted to take off, as did ‘SpotLight’- the Drama event. They then ran rounds of events in alternation- beginning with a round of Newspaper Dancing. This was followed by a hilarious mimicry of various singing stars courtesy one of the Ranbhoomi participants. On popular demand, a second round of Newspaper Dancing was held.
Meanwhile, Campus Roadies took off, with the top 15 candidates who had been previously shortlisted. A quiz, that dealt with the stock market and related concepts was organized by NSE- they gave out office organizers with built-in calculators- the perfect corporate accessory- as prizes . These activities went on, in parallel with the Volleyball Semi-final which was happening on the court adjacent to the Academic Block ( right by the Central Lawn, too!). In a closely contested match, IIM-Indore beat Amity University, to earn themselves a spot in the final. The Badminton final had to be abandoned due to unfavourable playing conditions. Amity University was declared the winner, based on their league scores with the other finalist, NMIMS (Mumbai).

Later in the night, we settled into the reading room of the library and sat there till 4 a.m., planning a grand event that would boost the presence of a sporting culture in the State and later across the country. An appreciation for sports other than cricket is very definitely needed.

1st March- the final day of Ranbhoomi! The day began with the football final at 8:30 a.m. and the second volleyball semi-final at the same time. The IIM-Indore team lost to Sagar Institute, Bhopal, in a closely-contested football match, by 2 goals to 1. The Volleyball final saw IIM-Indore beat Jaipuria University, 3-1 (25-23, 19-25, 25-11, and 25-23). The Chess event ran over three days, with IIM-Indore coming out on top, with Amity a close second. The basketball semi-finals began by late-afternoon. Sanghvi Institute of Management Studies won the first semi-final; IES IPS (Indore) beat IIM-Indore by an almost 20-point difference. The final began after an hour’s gap, where SIMS won against IES IPS, 66-49. Both sides had strong players, and the game was rather enjoyable. Meanwhile, the Closing Ceremony began in the New Auditorium at 3:30 p.m. Mir Ranjan Negi Sir was the Guest of Honour and handed out all the prizes, along with Director Sir, Dr. Rishikesha T. Krishnan. All the trophies and medals handed out were beautiful, and it was at this point that we felt the worst about there not being any girls’ teams for either Basketball or Volleyball.
As soon as the ceremony ended, we had the privilege of spending some one-on-one time with Negi Sir, interviewing him on behalf of the press. He spoke of encouraging sports, for people across all walks of life; he talked about Indore, how he fell in love with the IIM students and more.
Once our final press release (with only pictures of the EDM night and the artists due) was sent out, we could finally breathe. Final arrangements for the EDM night were being made- logos of sponsors were organized, the security team positioned themselves at strategic locations, sound-checks were performed and a contingency plan was prepared. The EDM Night took off at 8 p.m.; the party was in full swing by 10 p.m. We were backstage, sending out pictures to the media, before we made our way to the green room. We spent time with Rishabh from Lost Stories, while the Progressive Brothers were on stage.
The event was thoroughly enjoyed by everyone present and dancing (or not!).

After seeing all the guests off, we finally got ourselves some food and some much-needed rest! And, that kids, is how Ranbhoomi ’15 panned out!