The air outside was quite cool if not somewhat chilly. But insidethe auditorium of the Indian Institute of Management-Calcutta (IIM-C), it was decidedly hot. And quite appropriately so, for the hallwas the venue of the sixth edition of the Business Today-AdityaBirla Group Acumen (East Zone Finals) where for two days on November30 and December 1 top B-school students from across the regionengaged in a fierce war of words, intellect and knowledge with eachother in order to earn a berth in the national finals to be held inMumbai on December 15.
The audience, comprising mainly students from the participating B-schools, raucously cheered their teams, as the latter put fortharguments and counter-arguments in support of their contentionsduring tense debates and wracked their brains and intellects foranswers to some very difficult questions thrown at them byinimitable Acumen host Harsha Bhogle from his cue-cards during thequiz competition. Summing up the contest succinctly, Bhogle says:"The Business Today-Aditya Birla Group Acumen is about putting one'sacumen to test and that too with a dash of fun and entertainment."
The competition kicked off with the elimination round, which washotly contested by the participating teams. In the end, four teamseach in the debate, quiz and alumni quiz competitions made the cutfor the semi-finals. The debate semis for which the topics were "Wehave failed in building Brand India" and "India should push for anAsian Dollar", were keenly contested by IIM-C (Arzi Adbi and NaviinIbhrampurkar), Praxis Business School (Vinay Joshi and SaurabhAgarwal), Indian Institute of Social Welfare and BusinessManagement, Kolkata (Vivek Tiwari and Judhajit Sen) and XIM,Bhubaneswar (Sumeshwar Dhuper and Vandana Lisa). After an engagingbattle of words and wits, IIM-C and Praxis Business School qualifiedfor the zonal final.
The debate final tested the erudition of the students with thetopic "Diversified conglomerates will have to break up to retainfocus". And judging them, quite appropriately, were AmitChincholikar, Group Head, Compensation & Rewards, Aditya BirlaManagement Corporation and Manohar Samuel, Senior Vice President,Birla Cellulose. The IIM-C team argued in favour of diversifiedconglomerates. Its contention was that individual units always stoodto gain from being a part of a conglomerate, as the latter not onlyworked as a venture capitalist for them but also helped in bettercoordination with other units. Praxis Business School took theopposite stand, showing how sub-brands and associated brands workedwonders in a more focussed manner. The judges saw greater merit inthe arguments of IIM-C's Adbi and Ibhrampurkar and declared themwinners. The duo now go to Mumbai for the national finals.
The Zonal Quiz final was contested keenly by four teams fromXavier Labour Research Institute, Jamshedpur (Raghu M. Reddy andShrikant N.), Indian Institute of Social Welfare and BusinessManagement (Neelotpal Goswami and Jinu Mathew), IIM-C (Arnab Sinhaand Vijay Anand Menon) and IIFT (Vikram Sardeshpande and ManojBharathi). Some of the questions hurled at them were: (i) AhedaZanetti, a Lebanese who migrated to Australia, designed a swimwearfor Muslim women. What did she call it? Answer: Burqini. (ii) Whatdoes MSD stand for in the advertisement featuring Mahendra SinghDhoni? Answer: Monday to Sunday Dressing. (iii) His stint withadvertising began in 1987 with Allwyn's Trendy Watch campaign. Hewent on to compose more than 300 ad jingles--Boost with Kapil Devand Sachin Tendulkar, MRF Tyres, Premier Pressure Cooker, AsianPaints, Hero Puch, etc. He owns Panchathan Record Inn, one ofIndia's most advanced studios. Who is this person? Answer: A.R.Rahman. (iv) Marriott, the hotel chain, tops in terms of sales inwhich particular category? Answer: Inflight Catering. After sevengruelling rounds, the XLRI team emerged a clear winner.
The fun and excitement during the two-day jamboree reached itsclimax during the Alumni Quiz final. It kicked off in a ratherrelaxed atmosphere, but as the rounds progressed, it became chargedand tense. Sample some of the questions thrown at the contestants:(i) It is synonymous with 'money' in more than 14 languagesincluding French and at least one country is named after it. MiltonFriedman pointed out that it was a major monetary metal in history.Which metal is this? Answer: Silver. (ii) Till 1957 when the rupeewent decimal, how many pies were required to make up one rupee?Answer: 192 pies. (iii) When KBC introduced the first celebrityround with invited guests in 2000, four people were invited--RaniMukerji, Saif Ali Khan, Preity Zinta were three. Who was the fourthperson? Answer: Shah Rukh Khan. (iv) On May 6, 1919, US PresidentWoodrow Wilson did something that was a first in the history of airtravel. What was it? Answer: The first person to take out flightinsurance. (v) What's the name of the knowledge city that SabeerBhatia is developing near Panipat in Haryana? Answer: Nano City.Although Gautam Ghosh (IIM-C) and Arup Banerjee (Loyola Institute ofBusiness Administration, Chennai) started off extremely well, theduo lost ground to Rabi Sankar Saha (Delhi School of Economics) &Jayashree Mohanka (IIM-C) and Dushyanth Jayanthy (IIM-Bangalore) &Subhendu Roy (IIFT Delhi) as the rounds progressed. The Saha-Mohanka duo out-answered the others and booked a berth forthemselves at the national finals.
"Business is all about leadership and great leadership can onlycome from individuals who are not only sharp but are able tocommunicate their ideas effectively. Acumen is a platform thatbrings the best talent of aspiring business leaders to compete,"says Pavan Varshnei, Publishing Director, Business Today.
Chincholikar, Samuel and Varshnei gave away the prizes that weresponsored by Birla Cellulose and Harvard Business Review South Asia(all-India prize sponsor).
Apart from Business Today and the Aditya Birla Group, othersponsors and partners for the event were: TravelGuru, Aditya BirlaMinacs, Birla SunLife, Esprit (prize sponsors for the final),Headlines Today (TV partner), Fever 104 FM (radio partner),Exchange4Media.com (media partner), PaGalguy.com (online mediapartner) and IIM-C.
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