IIMC: The first impression

A day or two aren’t enough to get the first impression of an institute of the kind of IIMC. It took me 5 days to get the first impression. I know a lot of people expect to hear about state of the art buildings, a campus full of neatly maintained lawns and men and women in business formals sipping coffee in open air cafeterias discussing stuff on their laptops. Well that’s what I would have also thought of if I were to imagine the campus being an outsider. But I am not going to talk of it. Not that we don’t have good buildings, men and women in business formals, cafeteria and laptops but there are so many other things I have to talk of about IIMC. After all, buildings only make a good looking and not a good bschool.

I couldn’t see happy gatherings of seniors around Ramanujam hostel or the favorite Jetty. All I could see were PGP-I batchmates loitering around the campus. I could get the rare glimpses of seniors only during class breaks. I am saying all this because in IIT Roorkee all I could see were seniors all around the campus enjoying their life. The campus has tennis courts, basketball court, an amazing gym, badminton court and a nice swimming pool.

It was the second day when we first met seniors. And I found that they were not shying away from us. In fact they established a channel of wing guides for us to have a direct and non-hesitant interaction with them. The wing guides indeed are very helpful and they even went ahead of their ways to help us by themselves coming down to our rooms.

It took me two days to form my first impression about IIMC and another three days to validate it. And what I have concluded is, IIM Calcutta is about people. People cultivate culture, carry it forward, build the campus and it gets accumulated to what it is today. And by people I mean every individual involved here… right from those who work here in the shops and mess, to the admin staff and of course most importantly to faculty and students. Take them out and this place would be just another place.

People are focused here about their future. Because right from the first day they see that they are going to be out there in the corporate world among the best of the best doing some of the best and highly esteemed jobs in the industry. And that explains why I couldn’t find a single senior wasting his time around. But that doesn’t mean people don’t get involved in extra-currics. We have loads of clubs and events happening here. People do play lots of sports and if you are in NH you can find people playing footer volley in the quad.

What make the campus special are the lakes. Whatever point you are at in the campus, you can catch a glimpse of at least one lake. The Jetty near OH (Old Hostel) is one such place where people love to hand out at sunrise and sunsets. The Howrah Bridge as it is called is located near the auditorium connecting to faculty residential area. A walk in that area really left a feeling of serenity in my mind. The campus grows on you. And before you realize, it becomes a part of your life.

Weather in Kolkata is usually sultry and IIMC campus also stays so on a clear summer day. But with clouds and wind the weather changes considerably. The day I arrived at campus, I would have loved to sit by lakes if it were not raining just to enjoy the cold wind and the greenery.

Academic environment here is very healthy. I am not sure how strong the RG giri here is. But looking at the unity among the students community (despite the IIT like hostel and wing culture) I have a very serious doubt on that. I am no-one to be judging faculty members here. They truly are world class. For the first time in my life I have found all the subjects interesting.

Time spent at IIMC is regarded by many as the best daze of their life. And I do understand why people say that. I am sure I have already started to relate to it all.