IMNU on Pagalguy :)

A little information is always dangerous. There is an article on Institute of Management, Nirma University on Pagalguy here. Please read it. Oddly, it appears that we are in some school. Nice article though. Very informative. Witty and funny. Seriously.

I just feel like posting this as a rejoinder to allay fears that students are treated like school kids who get lollipops as rewards and raps on the knuckles as punishment for not doing their homework on time. Trust me, its not that bad a place.

If you are called Abhijeet or Abhishek or Abhik, you need not worry. Till date, there have been no casualties related to these unfortunate ones who had to sit on the first bench because their parents did not foresee their admission into IMNU. On a serious note, the alphabetical order of sitting arrangement is prevalent only in the first year and mostly in the first trimester. The purpose is to develop a degree of camaraderie between students and not to get all the Patels discussing Navratri bashes in Surat and the Singhs sitting together and missing the lassi from Ludhiana. Being the only Jason, I got to sit between a medical doctor from Alwar called Hitesh Gaur and an engineer from Nagpur called Kapil. Advantages - you talk, you make friends, you learn, you have fun, you love some things and you hate some but overall you have a blast. Suits me. By the way, I havent quite sat on the same seat after the 2nd trimester. I am a regular backbencher now. Reason - they dont kill you if you dont sit in the same seat after you have had your share of sitting with strangers. Because now strangers are friends. Disadvantages - You envy the guy who gets to chat up the hot babes just because he sits near them (it can be a bad thing sometimes), the teachers know where to find you, and its not possible to be absent and go unnoticed.

There is no PGP at IMNU, but there is a Pratish Nair (not the only CA around though) and he spends a lot of time playing FIFA and is a die-hard Chelsea fan.

It is not possible to keep track of all the activities of all the clubs. This blog has time and again failed to keep up with all that is happening at IMNU. For example, the week before we left for the Diwali break, we had movie screenings by the movie club, Showtime 2009 - a video making competition by Chehre, Goalzz 2009 - an inter B-school football tournament by Sports Committee, a talk on Business Plans by the entrepreneurship club, the HR Conclave, the finesse meet, a talk on internal marketing organised by the Marketing club, the book review meet by the book club, the formation of a new club for music and dance afficionados and I think that is all (Sorry if I have missed out any activity). Sometimes it becomes tough to report everything but there sure is something for each and every student.

There is no campus building. There are many institutes in the campus (pharmacy, technology, diploma studies, etc) and each institute has its set of buildings. The IMNU main building has an idol of Goddess Saraswati and trust me, things have not been a major turn off because of its presence. I have never seen students bow to it till today (in my 16 months of being here) but there are a few new comers who do. And yeah, if you are one of those who likes to bow to idols day in and day out, you will not be socially outcasted at IMNU. You can take my word for it.

The construction of all the buildings in the campus have a polygonal structure and the buildings have lots of arches (Someone show me some circles and circular structured buildings please, no water tanks please). It does get confusing but only if you have not stayed long enough to get used to the place. It takes about 3 days to figure out the structure and the locations unless you have some serious issue with directions and memory. Blocks in the institute building are exact replicas and yes, most of the students have been lost in the building, including yours truly. I invite you to come over and get lost (We will find you and its a promise).

We have a campus entry deadline of 11.00 pm and a hostel entry deadline of 11.30 pm. Its true. Its not the end of the world though. The day begins at 11.30 pm. The scope of activities that start at 11.30 pm is too large to be covered in this amount of space so we will let it pass. We will have a seperate article on Life after hostel entry sometime in the future.

Equality of girls and boys and ethics sounds cool (and slightly like the ideals aspired for in India's freedom struggle). Whatever. Guilty of being too busy having fun to have noticed. We must investigate more on this front.

Much of what has been said of the canteens in the article is true. The pharmacy canteen is the most popular. A lot of the popular hangouts (Tapri, RD) get no mention. Green benches are popular but then there are other places in the campus where folks meet up (the D-Block, the Main Stage, the Fountain). The committees have designated places to meet within the campus. Green benches is the unofficial hangout where impromptu meets take place, birthdays are celebrated, and water fights

To set a few things straight, here are a few facts for those curious about IMNU. Started in 1996, IMNU has its inherent strengths. And weaknesses. The best way to know how good a college is not to go by rankings but to come and see the campus and the things on offer yourself. Talk to the students, the faculty members, and in the case of IMNU maybe the security guards as well. There are rankings that rate private business schools in NCR higher than ISB, Hyderabad. I'm not too sure how much you can go by such rankings. IMNU does not take part in most ranking surveys. Also, IMNU is also not much into advertising. I havent ever seen an advertisement from IMNU. The students take initiatives to promote IMNU but these are few and far between and cannot compete with the visibility that most other B-schools get because of superior promotion.

Having said that, at the end of the day, if you really wanna know how good IMNU is - come and see, talk and feel, check things out yourself. If you cant come over, send some spies. There is nothing to hide. If we suck at some things, we do. If we rock at some, we do. Recruiter or aspirant or just plain curious mind, come on over. Its a whole new world.