Xpressions 09 : Annual B-school event of Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneshwar

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Par 100 posts (V.I.P)
PRESS RELEASE

Date: November 12, 2009

Xpressions ‘09, the annual B-school event of Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar (XIMB), kicked off on Thursday evening with its flagship corporate panel discussion, ‘Conclave’. This was followed by the official launch of Xpressions, which culminated in a splendid display of fireworks. The four flagship games of Xpressions – Kurukshetra, Gladiator, Skill City and Helios were then launched with equal fanfare and enthusiasm, each in its own unique traditional style. These have participants from the top B-schools all over India including IIM’s, XLRI, MDI, IIFT and FMS, and will be played over the course of the next three days.

The topic for ‘Conclave’ this year was ‘Power India – Power Leveraged from all its Diversities’ and attracted eminent speakers from different walks of life to discuss this topic from various viewpoints. In the panel were present Ms Rashmi Bhansal, Co-Founder & Editor, JAM, and author of the well-acclaimed book, ‘Stay Hungry Stay Foolish’, and Mr Sandeep Pandey, Co-Founder, Asha for Education, Ramon Magsaysay Award winner in The Emergent Leadership Category and leading social activist. Also on the panel were Mr B.K. Sabharwal, Chairman, ANMI, and Director of the Delhi Stock Exchange, Mr V.K. Sood, MD, WESCO & NESCO, and Director, SOUTHCO, and Mr Pawan Agarwal, XIMB Alumnus and Director for Corporate and Government Ratings, CRISIL. The discussion was moderated by XIMB’s very own Prof. D.V. Ramana, who is also Academic Advisor for SPJCM, Singapore & Dubai and Director, Bhubaneswar Stock Exchange. The special guest for the evening was Mr Sunil Sastry, Principal Consultant with PA Consulting Group, Bangalore.
Ms Rashmi Bansal, who is an IIM-A alumnus, started things off by illustrating how, even in diversity, we are all united in dreams and goals in life, and seek to isolate ourselves from the diversity, and how each person should break out his or her own individual diversity and bring his potential to the fore to make a difference to the country.

Mr V.K. Sood stressed on one’s commitment to work and loyalty to his or her organization, as opposed to the norm of loyalty to oneself. He said that if each one of us is focussed towards our country’s objectives and combine it with performance and hard work, there is nothing that can stop our country from progressing and reaching its goals.

Mr Sandeep Pandey’s take on the negatives of diversity in politics, religion and local sentiments was interesting, but he also pointed out the fact that ours had been and still is a successful democracy in all except two years of its independence. According to him, we cannot truly progress unless diversity in the economy on the scale that we have in our country is reduced drastically by concentrating on primary production and agriculture instead of services.

Mr B.K. Sabharwal spoke about the diversity in the finance sector and the unexplored opportunities lying there while Mr Pawan Agarwal stressed that economic liberalization combined with the diversity of skills that our population gifts us leads to budding entrepreneurs, who should take the lead in encouraging the people of our country to reverse the recent trend of spending patterns shifting to benefit other countries rather than India itself.
Our special guest, Mr Sastry was invited to the dais to say a few words. He was vocal about us, as a country being holistically strategic, instead of solution oriented, to be innovative in the rural region and for each and every individual to be completely transparent.

The floor was then thrown open to questions from the house and several important issues were brought up and discussed among the panellists, including vote bank politics and the choice of party over candidates.
Dr D.V. Ramana brought the discussion to a close, citing the XIMB initiative of PSR, Personal Social Responsibility, as definitive actions, rather than CSR, Corporate Social Responsibility, which are generally restricted to thoughts and no more, followed by the vote of thanks. Mementos were presented to each of the speakers and the special guest by Dr. Subhajyoti Roy, Dean Academics.

Over the next three days, XIMB will reverberate with ‘Freedom’, which is the Xpressions ’09 theme. It will bring together participants from colleges of different streams, and corporates too, in a gamut of events ranging from business simulation games to communication development programmes, paper presentations and cultural events ranging from fashion shows to rock nights. Xpressions ’09 culminates with Mohit Chauhan (of Masakali and Tum Se Hi fame) performing live on campus on Sunday evening. Xpressions ’09 is being covered by Channel [V] for their new campus show ‘School of Cool’ and also by Red FM.
 
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