Question 1

What is the fee for SC/ST students in IIM A, B, and C?

Accepted Answer

There is no concession for SC/ST students in IIM A, B and C. But this is not a major issue.

IIMs offer a lot of financial aid services to financially weak people. In some cases, the entire fee is paid by the college or some part. It depends on the judgment of the panel on the basis of your situation.

All IIMs offer educational loans at a relatively low interest rate. Banks usually consider IIM students as a profitable investment. So rather than worrying about the money, focus more on your goals.

Question 2

How is IIM Calcutta for the advanced program in data science, 1 year certification course? Is it better than the ISB Hyderabad course and IIITB PGD in data analytics?

Accepted Answer

In my opinion, the IIM APDS is just an average course. ISB Hyderabad course is much better. It’s better to do Data Science courses from technical universities rather than Management colleges like IIM. Also, the IIM APDS course is quite expensive and more like a BA course than Data Science. It focuses more on Business Mathematics/ Business case study discussion than how to explore a data set.

ISBs course best among these courses because it has all the things that are required:

Brand
Faculty
Industry Connect
Curriculum
Alumni

Also this course has more time for all the subjects and capstone projects too. The only drawback is the high fees.

Question 3

What are the best courses to take in IIM Calcutta?

Accepted Answer

My brother is in IIM Calcutta and over the period of 2 years he has studied many valuable courses. But 3 of them top the list of his favorites.

Statistics for Management: Taught by Prof. Rahul Mukerjee, this course is a mandatory Term-I course. More than the subject itself it’s the professor that makes it an amazing experience. He is the recipient of many national awards and has taught all over the world at reputed universities like Harvard.
Options, Futures and Derivatives: IIM Calcutta is without a doubt the finance campus of India. The finance faculty is the best you can get and this course does justice to finance completely. It’s quite a tough subject based on derivatives and technical finance. But for a true finance lover, it’s the best. It is taught by Prof. Binay Bhushan Chakrabarti (BBC) who was the Gold Medalist of the Batch of 1980 from IIM Calcutta.
Management of Self: Another eye-catching course at IIM Calcutta is Management of Self taught by Prof. Leena Chatterjee. She is a motherly figure in college. This is the only course here that teaches you about nothing but your own self. It’s a sort of personality grooming course that requires you to take a few personality tests and write an autobiography. This course helps you get more familiar with yourself and overcome internal struggles. It’s a Term-V elective course.

Although all courses offered at IIM Calcutta have their own benefits, these 3 are among the best maybe because of the respective professors.

Question 4

What if I convert IIMs but don't have enough money to pay the fees?

Accepted Answer

Trust me if you get into any IIM, banks will be after you to get loans from them. Banks consider an IIM student a good investment and therefore offer educational loans at a very low interest rate.

My uncle’s son had cleared CAT and got into IIM Calcutta. He got a loan from a bank at an extremely low interest rate. He had to deposit a demand draft of INR 3,23,050 at the time of the MBA registration process (second week of June). The rate of interest is 8.4%. After MBA, you will be in the 30% tax slab. The interest paid on an education loan is tax-deductible. So, your effective rate of interest is 8.4(1–0.3)=5.88%. This is the cheapest loan one can get in India. So it’s recommended that you take a loan even if you have money.

Banks like SBI, CBI, BOI, and PNB will give you loans as high as 30 lakhs without any collateral.

Apart from loans, IIM Calcutta also offers a lot of financial assistance to financially weak students. Need-based-scholarships are offered. IIM Calcutta provides Financial Assistance to students whose family income is less than 8 Lakhs.

Rather than worrying about money focus more on your goals and academics.

Question 5

Which is best -MBA in finance from ISB Hyderabad or top IIMS A/B/C?

Accepted Answer

ISB Hyderabad is known for its lack of specialization in Finance. It’s a common understanding now that even if one is preferring ISB Hyderabad for admission, they know that they should go for anything but Finance. Studying some aspects will give you a deeper insight as to why MBA in Finance from ISB Hyderabad is not recommended.

Faculty: Although the visiting faculty is quite decent, it’s the domestic faculty that has ruined the culture at ISB. They are arrogant, pathetic, and extremely incapable. They insult the students regularly and disturb student-teacher relations.

Placements: The roles offered in Finance were below average like Operations, Sales, and BD roles. Such roles were offered in abundance by the banks or start-ups. However, the superior roles like IB/PE/VC/M&A/FP&A/Equity Research/Credit Rating/Asset Management/TAS were offered scarcely. For instance

only 10 FP and A roles were allotted that too only to CAs
Only one Investment banking role was offered by Barclays
Only 5 PE/bc roles were offered and there was a strong preference for a prior IB/PE/VC experience and IIT undergraduate background.
One M and A role was offered only
4 Asset Management and zero Equity Research and Credit Rating roles were offered.

So the best roles were offered limitedly while the batch size stood at 900. Most students ended up with unsatisfactory placements. Now you can decide whether or not to join if you are confident to face the placement scenario.

Question 6

Which is best option, the executive program in sales and marketing at IIM Calcutta or the postgraduate certification in business management at XLRI, Jamshedpur?

Accepted Answer

Only the full-time PGP courses of IIM Calcutta or XLRI are valuable. All other degrees/certificates are the only means of earning money by the institutes.

They have no real value in real life or the corporate world.
They won’t be very useful if you want to learn.
They add no value to your CV
You will not be considered alumni of the institute

So these certificate courses/ part-time programs/ Executive programs carry no real value at all. Most people are misled to believe that they might add value to their CV.

Question 7

What is the benefit of doing executive programme in business management from IIM Calcutta with 5 years work experience as manager accounts in a manufacturing industry?

Accepted Answer

If you are working in a company with great turnover and managing a leadership role, this programme is of little benefit to you. But if you want to open your own start-up and are willing to learn the know-how of business management and leadership skills this course welcomes you. Some major benefits of the course are:

Many companies sponsor for you and are willing to take you back after the course
This programme should be undertaken with long term benefits in mind. You should be confident that broadening your horizons will definitely pay you back one day later or sooner.
For people who are always willing to learn more and more it’s the perfect course. It’s a tightly packed one year programme

But every coin has two sides. As much as this course is beneficial in the long run it has its own drawbacks. Some drawbacks you should definitely know are:

People who have lost their touch in academics will not be able to cope with the tight scheduled course
The placement opportunities are rare around 10-20% of the entire batch
People who are low on budget tend to take educational loans which are not worth this course.

So this course has its benefits but they are long term and one needs patience to uncover them.

Question 8

What are the reviews for an executive diploma in digital marketing at IIM Calcutta?

Accepted Answer

The following review is based on personal experience with my sister who got enrolled in the current batch.

The following points will surely change your mind regarding the executive diploma in digital marketing at IIM Calcutta:

Quality of the batch is extremely poor. It is more like a money making program than a knowledge imparting one.
The fee for this program is exceptionally high. The course is priced at 3,28,000 for just 6 months. Whereas digital marketing institutes offer better courses at fees as low as INR 5000.
The quality of the curriculum is below average. Rather than focusing on the main topic they are stuck to age old basic concepts of traditional marketing.
No placement assistance is there for this programme.
Lastly, this certification adds no value to your CV.

Don’t go for this program. The time and money are not worth investing in. Rather go for digital marketing institutes where industry experts will teach you better skills at low fees and less duration.

Question 9

Which one should I opt for: PGDCM from IIM Calcutta or PGPM from IIM Lucknow?

Accepted Answer

If we compare PGDCM and PGDM at IIM Calcutta, we see that both the courses have the same networking, placements and even infrastructure.

Now if you compare both the IIMs, IIMC and IIML, there is hardly any difference in the curriculum or even placements. So deciding which IIM to go for depends on your own preferences.

But if you are planning to quit IT then I suggest going for the full-fledged MBA course from IIM Lucknow rather than a system at IIM Calcutta.

IIM Lucknow will offer excellent exposure and placements and you will end up getting an above average salary package for consulting.

Question 10

How good is the EPBA Course of IIM Calcutta? How helpful is it in getting another job in Analytics?

Accepted Answer

The EPBA or Executive Program on Business Analytics is a one year part time course with a fees of around INR 5.10 Lakh. The benefits you will derive from this course are

You will get an excellent exposure to data science
You will become well versed in all aspects of business, marketing, finance, supply chain, operations
it opens various doors of the many new opportunities for your business company

Keep in mind that this is not a specialisation course. Rather it exposes you to a broad spectrum of data sciences and will teach you how the analytics should be used to power your business decisions. This course adds a great value to managers and business leaders.

But if you are looking for a beginners course in tool expertise in Data Science, then this course is not for you.