For the first time ever, Indian Institute of Management, Ranchi (IIM-R) has won the ‘Mahindra War Room’ award, a contest giving management students the opportunity to creatively respond to live and realistic business issues through a rigorous evaluation process. Four students of this institute’s Post Graduate Diploma in Management (PGDM) 2012-14 batch have made this dream come true.
Surprisingly, these four students namely Nipun Bansal, R Venkatesh, Archan Rawell and Priyank Deshmukh were declared the national winners among 22 top business (B) schools of India. This competition started six years back. last year, too this team had participated in this national competition but was disqualified after reaching the top 22 B-school contender position in this event.
Speaking about the details, Archan said, “Sometime, in the months of August or September, Mahindra uploads about this event on their website and on Facebook. They also send an official email to the placement committee of all the B-Schools during the same time mentioning the registration of interested students in a team of four members.”
“We then have to download 18 case studies and do a comprehensive study and find a solution to one of those in a span of 1.5 to 2 months. Thereafter, we upload our research based study in a power point presentation within the stipulated date. This year it was October 30,” added Archan. Out of sheer passion, the students chose case study named ‘Rural Health Insurance Scheme’ and visited villages and hospitals in and around Ranchi. Describing the reason behind this selection, Archan said, “We wanted to make a small difference in the lives of rural people. Though, we knew the cause we were addressing was much larger than the competition. Infact, the villagers cooperated with us. It was found that most of them are not aware of this health insurance scheme. As a result, their entire livelihood savings are spent in bearing medical expenses, in case a family member is hospitalized or suffers from any serious health ailment.”
On November 5, the team was shortlisted as wild card entry participants and clubbed in the north zone category B-schools. They were then felicitated for their achievement on November 14 after competing with 21 teams at the final stage in front of top Mahindra leaders at Grand Hyatt Hotel in Mumbai.
This strategy contest has become a cult brand in India’s top B-school campuses, and students await the entire experience right from the launch till the Grand Finale. “The intent of this mega-event is to provide an opportunity for India’s best and brightest B-School minds to improve their strategy skills,” mentioned a student of IIM-R. As far as this achievement with career is concerned, Archan said, “It does helps in campus selection since it is an added achievement pointed in our resume.”