XL Alumni Achievement '06-'07: A Round-Up

Here is a compilation of the achievements by XL alumni during last one year (06-07).

Though the list is neither complete nor comprehensive, at least it is indicative of the diverse fields in which XLRI Alumni have been achieving excellence:

Aquil Busrai (72PMIR), Executive Director (HR), IBM India, was conferred the Life-Time Achievement Award for his work in the field of HR by the National HRD Network.

Sujit Baksi (72PMIR) took over as the President, Tech Mahindra.

Vikram Rao (75BMD), head of ABG’s Garment Business, joined the Board of Aditya Birla Group.

Prof Gerald Tellis (BMD 1977), the Director of the Center for Global Innovation, Neely Chair of American Enterprise and Professor of Marketing at the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California (LA), was awarded 2006 Mahajan Award for Lifetime Contributions to Marketing Strategy Research by 2006 American Marketing Association Educators' conference in Chicago.

Harsh Kumar (78BMD) was appointed the Managing Director of Mahindra Intertade.

Prakash Puram (78BMD), CEO, ixMatch, was inducted as a Member into US President’s Export Council (PEC), making him the first India-born MBA to take up an advisory role to the White House

Bijou Kurian (81BMD) joined Reliance Retail Venture’ Lifestyle Business as the CEO.

R Ramakrishnan (82BMD), President and COO of Bajaj Electricals was invited to address the 1000+ gathering of professionals at the Campus Symposium of Iselorn, Germany. The other speakers included Bill Clinton, Lord Chris Patton (frm Governer of Hong Kong), the German Finance Minister, and CEOs of Credit Suisse, Audi, Mushreq Bank, etc.

George Zacharias (82BMD) was appointed the Managing Director, Yahoo! India.

Suri Venkat (83PMIR) took over as the Chief Operating Officer of Sify.

Vinod Sawhney (83BMD) was appointed as the CEO of Bharti Retail (P) Ltd.

Rajan Krishnan (85BMD) took over as the Business Head of the Principal Mutual Fund, the Asset Management Group of PNB.

Vineet Nayar (85BMD), President, HCL Techologies Ltd., was featured in the Fortune magazine for creating, as the title of the article says, “The Most Modern Management – in India”.

Surajit Shome (86BMD) was appointed the Managing Director and Head of Investment Banking of Lehman Brothers India.

Gargi Banerji (86PMIR), Founder of Pragya, was given Sadguru Gnanananda National Award (2007) for her work on environmental conservation. She was felicitated by the Governer of Tamil Nadu, Mr Surjit Singh Barnala.

Vijay Nair (87PMIR) published his second book, and first novel, “Master of Life Skills”. The book was launched by Harper Collins India, and received very favourable reviews.

Vikas Gupta (88BMD) joined the Anand Bazar Patrika Ltd as the President, BusinessWorld magazine, and the Chief Marketing Officer.

Milind Chalisgaonkar (89BMD) took over as the CEO of the Bharti AXA General Insurance India.

Ashish Rajpal (92BMD), the co-founder & Managing Director of iDiscoveri, was featured among the “50 Leaders shaping the Indian Education in India” in Education World.

Rajiv Kaul (92BMD), the former Managing Director of Microsoft India, joined as Partner, Actis in London.

Anu Kumar (94PMIR), with Economic and Political Weekly, published her 2nd book “Letters for Paul” (Mapin Books). The book was released by Shyam Benegal at Crossword, Mumbai.

Mohit Nayyar (95PMIR), Director – HR, P&G India was awarded the “Young Achiever” award by the National HRD Network.

Brajesh Bajpai (96BMD) moved from Pepsi to take over as the Country Manager, Marico - Egypt.

Dinu Poonacha (96BMD) was appointed the President – Corporate Stategy and Planning for the Rs. 2,300cr Yash Birla Group.

Anuradha Vijayakrishnan (98BMD), with Citibank, was selected by the renowned literary agent, David Godwin for her forthcoming novel, making her the 60th such author worldwide, and the 6th Indian (including Arundhati Roy).

S Ministhy (98PMIR), an IAS officer and rank-holder of her batch, published her first book of short stories “Unequal Equations.”

Ajay MK (99PMIR), Head - HR, Colgate Palmolive (Malaysia & Singapore), and the G-Sec of the batch, published his first book of short stories: “Drizzle of Yesteryears & Other Stories” (Frog Books, India).

Nandita de Cunha (01BMD), a consultant with KPMG, published her first book, “The Magic of Maya” (Rupa Publications). The book was released by Anil Dharkar at Crossword bookstore, Mumbai.

Kumar Anand (05BMD) and Lara Lobo (06PMIR), both in Standard Chartered Bank (India), won the Microsoft Corporate Challenge 2006 – an event involving cross country running & cycling, rowing, puzzle cracking, deciphering, map navigation, stock market simulation, etc, - and competing against 35 participating corporates included the likes of Barclays Bank, ICICI Securities, ICICI Bank, J P Morgan Stanley and a host of others like Unilever, Infosys and our formidable Indian Navy.