Management education system should focus on aam-aadmi: Sibal

Union HRD Minister Kapil Sibal today stressed upon the need for utilising management education system to provide solutions to problems faced by the common man. “Can we, in the management system, bring about a change of mindset and look at management solutions that actually impact and affect the ordinary man on the street—-the aam aadmi?” Sibal asked.

He was here to inaugurate the campus of the Institute of Management Technology (IMT) on the outskirts of the city.

“We must actually start thinking through the management education system on connecting management solutions to the aam-aadmi. Unless we move forward in that direction, the kind of wealth that we hope to create through management schools, will not be created for the good of the nation,” Sibal said.

“However, at the moment, our management schools are centered around getting placements (for their students) in big firms for fat salaries. This is really a tragedy,” the HRD Minister said. “Even children who come to the management schools, look at the end of the one/two-year management courses to get employed in some profitable enterprise,” he added.

“I think, this a wrong way of looking at management, because it is much more than getting fat salaries,” he said adding that it is now time to change the nature of management instruction and education.

“There are huge problems in the country and there is a need to study the management of socio-economic issues in the society. I don’t think there are any courses taught in India or in management schools that look at education as a management issue,” the Union Minister said.

"We have to look into the issues of management for poverty. No case-study has been done with reference to slums and the people living there. There are other problems like how to manage 55 lakh teachers in schools and recruitment of these teachers and how do you manage a school administration, among others," Sibal said.