IIM B EPGP’s Sammantran Shines Spotlight on Untapped Potential of Unorganized Sector

Experts from banking and financial services sectors, entrepreneurs & academicians come up with ways to empower and strengthen the country’s self-organized workforce at a unique event hosted by IIMB’s One Year Full Time MBA (EPGP) students. IIM B EPGP students won the first prize in the business plan competition organised at the event while students from We School came up tops in the case study competition. 

IIM Bangalore’s One Year Full Time MBA (EPGP) students hosted their flagship Annual Business Conclave Sammantran on 1st November, 2015. The conclave, themed ‘India Unorganized – Tapping the Untapped Potential’, brought together a wonderful mix of industry chiefs, policy advocates, academicians and business school students.

55% of India’s $1.85-trillion economy is informal and more than 90% of the total workforce is engaged in this informal sector. Does this represent a a humongous challenge or a big opportunity? Sammantran explored this topic ind depth with its theme ‘India Unorganized – Tapping the Untapped Potential’.

55% of India’s $1.85-trillion economy is informal and more than 90% of the total workforce is engaged in this informal sector. Does this represent a a humongous challenge or a big opportunity?

In his inaugural address, Prof. U. Dinesh Kumar, Chairperson, EPGP, spoke about the need to collectively address the challenges faced by the unorganized sector. He set the tone for the day’s events and panel discussions quoting from his own consulting experience with a micro-credit organization.

Rajni Mishra, SBI’s Chief General Manager, was the keynote speaker. Her insights into the role of the banking sector and the opportunities lying ahead in organizing the unorganized resonated with the audience. She highlighted the role of promoting a cashless economy, raising financial literacy, promoting healthcare and improving agricultural productivity. She further deliberated on the contextual challenge of how rural lending can be made a viable business model. Reiterating the need for tackling agricultural distress, she said its time ‘Bharat’ moves from ‘Krishi Darpan’ to a mobile app.

IIM B EPGP Students – Winners of the B-Plan Competition

Manthan, the panel discussion focused on the challenges being faced in organizing the unorganized sector by bringing in thought leaders from the corporate arena.

Led by Prof. R.Vaidyanathan, eminent academician and author of the acclaimed book ‘India UnInc’, the panel included Praveen Khandelwal, National Secretary General, Confederation of All India Traders, Dr. Debolina Dutta, Director and Head, VF Brands, Anurag Gupta, Chairman and CEO, A Little World Pvt. Ltd., and PC Musthafa, CEO, iD Foods.

Prof. Vaidyanathan emphasized how only 31% of the total credit goes to the unorganized sector and the rest to corporates, “And yet the major NPA accounts are in the name of corporates,” he added. The discussion touched upon issues such as convergence of payment modes to encourage more cashless transactions, the importance of entrepreneurship in organizing the unorganized sector, the increase in efficiency by engaging the unorganized sector and the absence of computerization despite India going from strength to strength in software services.

The audience were deeply motivated by PC Musthafa’s story of using his MBA to identify the opportunity the hugely unorganized “idli batter” business presents and the way he has been able to exploit the same.

MDI One Year MBA Students Were Runners-up at the B-Plan Competition

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Dr. Dutta emphasized the challenges facing hiring managers due to the inherent contradictions between the existing multiple laws for unorganized sector workers.

Anurag Gupta spoke about how, still, only cash works in the Indian economy and there is a greater need for convergence of all payment modes.

Mr. Praveen Khandelwal gave some incisive ground level perspectives on issues facing the retail sector. The packed auditorium gave him a thunderous applause when he declared, “Do not call us the unorganized sector; we are the most self-organized sector”.

The audience, though in concurrence with the challenges facing the informal sector, questioned the meagre contribution of this sector to the tax base.

Mr. Abhijit Ray, Co-founder and Managing Director, Unitus Capital, then talked about financing the unorganized sector. His company’s policy of raising capital for businesses that make huge social impact and bringing customized solutions was an eye opener for students. They appreciated how the financing of Small and Medium-sized Enterprise (SME) businesses add great value to the community.

Speaking on skill development, one of the key loopholes in this whole context of unorganized sector, Meena Raghunathan, Director, Community Services of the GMR Varalakshmi Foundation, urged the community to understand the importance of skilling and quoted examples on how skill development can take the Indian economy to the next level.

Students From We School Won the Case Competition

Students from MDI Gurgaon, IIM Raipur, XIME Bangalore, etc. brought to fore their creativity and business acumen in Nirmiti, The Business Hackathon contest conducted as part of Sammantran 2015. They provided a workable solution to a critical business problem facing a large nationalized bank.

Team Chanakyas (Pranal Prasad Dongre, Mohamed Jaffer Ali and Vinod Sankaranarayanan) from IIM Banglore’s EPGP won the event and bagged a cash prize of INR 45,000. Team Red Devils (Gaurav Kapoor, Soumik Tarafdar and Shishir Sehgal) from MDI Gurgaon’s One Year MBA (NMP) were the runners up and they won prize money of INR 25,000. The event was judged by YV Ramana Murthy, General Manager, SBI, and Prof. Abhoy K Ojha, IIM Bangalore.

The case contest – Abhyas – too was closely contested with Team Well comprising Abhishek Puranik and Hari Krishna Reddy B from We School of Business, Bangalore, emerging victorious over MICA Ahmedabad’s Aneek Das, Maninder Singh Chhabra and Kushan Dutta. The winners bagged prize money of INR 35,000 and the runners up INR 20,000. The jury comprised Sumit Ganguli, CEO, GAVS Technologies and Prof. U Dinesh Kumar and Prof. K Kumar, from IIM Bangalore.

With experienced professionals making up the EPGP batch who are on track to become tomorrow’s thought leaders, IIM B says Sammantran this year played a pioneering role in discussing ideas about a complex and challenging problem. It left the audience thinking about the challenges and opportunities in the informal sector, a deep understanding of the criticality of focusing on this sector and the means to do it, and a closer connect to a workforce which contributes almost 55% to the country’s GDP.