XLRI - supports home grown entrepreneurs

Excerpt from Business Standard

........ XLRI-Jamshedpur has introduced a deferred placement policy this year, applicable to the 2008 batch of students and onwards.

Uday Damodaran, placements chairman of XLRI, notes: “From this year, we will allow students interested in starting entrepreneurial ventures to take the plunge and push back their participation in campus placements for a maximum period of two years. Our aim is to extend as much support as possible to students who wish to become entrepreneurs. A policy like this will provide students the emotional security needed while taking a risk during the initial years of a career.”

XLRI Jamshedpur has also decided to support a group of six first-year students with Rs 3 lakh for their entrepreneurial venture. These six have decided to start Parichay.co.in, a portal to link tribal artisans with the mainstream market and provide them a platform to reach out to connoisseurs of art across the world.

“As the six students put together the portal and decided on the revenue earning model, we at XLRI thought of supporting them with the initial funds required to put the project in place,” reasoned Madhukar Shukla, faculty at XLRI......

Read the entire article at Business Standard

This is an amazingly supportive set of steps taken by XLRI to support Entrepreneurs who are ready to bring their ideas to life, straight out of campus.

While a lot of Xlers have gone on to become entrepreneurs later in life. - case in point PandiaRajan of IR 84 who was recently in the news - the guys behind http://www.parichay.co.in : Chintan, Darshan, Kaushal, Siddharth, Vikas & Vivek are fortunate to have this kind of support straight out of XL.

Dreams are always bigger and risks are most often lower, when one is straight out of campus. Having the security of being able to come back for regular placements within 2 years and some financial backing from the institute can obviously spur an individual much much higher.

This could be a major step akin to the research grants awarded to students of technical/technological sciences in the US.

XLRI values entrepreneurship and social responsibility. http://www.parichay.co.in is an endeavour that combines both and I wish these xlers all the very best.
Kim