Why the IIPM story needs to be told over and over again

IIPM is again making news, of the wrong kind of course. Many thanks to Careers 360 for bringing to light, again, the truth beind the tall claims by IIPM.

Incidentally Outlook, also published by Maheshswer Peri, had banished the institute from its B-school rankings. But that didn’t prevent IIPM from flaunting Outlook‘s ranking on its ads.

Though for many this wouldn’t be news. Back in 2005 IIPM had brought in some excitement to the Indian blogosphere because of something similar.

But unfortunately this story has to be repeated over and over again. IIPM hasn’t learnt any lesson, not that we expected it to, and continues making pompous claims in full-page ads on major national dailies (I doubt any of those would publish any negative news on IIPM) and students still fall for such arrogates.

Therefore it becomes a responsibility for people who are aware of the facts to disseminate the other side of the story at regular intervals. We might not have the resources for full-page colour ads but we have the strength of community and we should use it for the advantage of the unsuspecting and gullible students who spend lakhs of their parents earnings for a ‘degree’ whose worth is under question.

And here’s the joke of the week:

Move over London, Wharton, Harvard here comes “The Greatest B-School on Earth” IIPM!

Arindam Chaudhuri’s vocabulary seems to be limited to superlatives (and someone please fire his designer. On second thoughts, don’t. I want my laughs.). Or he is a firm subscriber of the famous adage favoured by the Nazis “The bigger the lie, the more it will be believed.”

I think people with access to Shah Rukh Khan should advise him to reconsider his association with IIPM. People tend to falsely add credibility to whatever a star endorses. I, on my part, have sent a tweet to the Twitter account believed to be Shah Rukh’s.

And there’s also Planman CHE (Centre for Higher Education) and the logo, you guessed it, the star on Che Guevara’s beret.

Prospective students should be very wary of the ads published by institutes and always read the fine print. I happened to notice this on yesterday’s edition of The Indian Express.

Dr MGR Educational and Research Institute University, Chennai, advertisess itself as “India’s No. 4 University” but the fact is that it ranks fourth (according to a Financial Express study) only amongst the universities established after 2000. Though to their credit, it is mentioned in the ad, but something that could easlily miss the eye.

By the way, what happened to the multi-crore lawsuit fromm 2005? Only bow-wow-wow?