Intaglio Day-2
(10th January 2009)
The Jokatimes Intaglio Series
Empires of the Mind – Finals
After a thoroughly impressive first round which saw a participation of over 600 teams from across the world, six teams made it to the finals of Empires of the Mind. The first round was designed as a quest where the members visited locations across the world, answering questions relevant to the locality visited, to earn points. The participants had to strategize on maximizing points (which were in terms of a fictional currency) by wisely choosing locales, difficulty of questions, and trading of turns.
This highly innovative round was made to look bland by the final round. Here, every team represented a planet and prepared for an inter-galactic war. A direct application of game theory in competitive setting, this game consisted of seven rounds. The teams could buy / sell raw material and weapon-making technologies between themselves. The team which was best prepared to fight the war at the end of the seven rounds came out as the winners.
The event had finalists from various B-schools in India. The winners were from IIM Calcutta. Highly appreciated by participants from all over, Empires of the Mind was a grand success.
Christopher’s Compass: Marketing Research Event
The Marketing Research Event at Intaglio, Christopher’s Compass received a good response as interest in marketing is in an upswing all around the country. The participants had to develop a Market Research Plan and carry out basic field work within IIMC to help a MNC locate its proposed top end retail apparel outlet from one amongst three locations in Kolkata. The knowledge partners for the event were IMRB, and Mr. Prasonjit from IMRB judged the final rounds of the event. The initial round saw close to 250 participants with only 5 teams making the last round. The event was won by the team “Rats On The Paddle Wheel†from IIM Bangalore.
Olympus
All the hard work and perseverance of a group of immensely talented and focused individuals came to a head on the second day of Intaglio 2008-09 as Olympus reached its final stages. The extensive and exhaustive leadership hunt, the first of its kind when launched last year, culminated with a debate on the leadership abilities of the main protagonists in two contrasting movies, Braveheart & Hotel Rwanda, with three final participants selected from the chosen 8 moving to the final round titled “The Prestigeâ€. Prestige saw each set of two participants out of three take turns to recommend or disparage the claims of the third contestant for the post of the CEO of a new subsidiary with the judging panel, comprised of Professors Anup Sinha, Debhasish Bhattacharjee and popular quiz master speaker, and Director of Kolkata Knight Riders Mr. Joy Bhattacharya, acting as the board of directors of the company. In between the rounds, the 8 participants, including one each from the 
Wharton Business School, America and CEIBS, Shanghai, China, spoke about their incredible experiences and amazing fun they had during Olympus. The finalists turned out to be Mr. Harsh Chapparia from IIMC, David Larsson from Wharton and Ms. Joo Yi from CEIBS. “The Prestige†separated Joo as the outstanding candidate for the year and she was awarded Rs. 1.5 lakhs as prize money for successfully scaling Olympus. In short, an event worth remembering for the viewers, worth cherishing for the participants and totally impossible of ever forgetting for the wonderful organizational team, headed by Debtosh Mishra and Jignanshu Gor, both of IIM Calcutta,
Ad Labs CEO Mr. Anil Arjun Talk
Intaglio 2008-09 saw the CEO of Ad Labs, Mr. Anil Arjun give a talk on the Indian entertainment industry as a whole and the scope and activities of Adlabs in particular. Comparing the Indian entertainment industry to the U.S. Mr. Arjun elaborated on the similarities and differences, with the former increasing and the latter melting away. Mr. Arjun talked about the tremendous demand in India for the entertainment content, and correlation between movies, television and radio in terms of audience preferences, providing a variety of market opportunities. Mr. Arjun then delved into the various productions Adlabs had gone into in the past one year, explaining how the company saw value in producing, distributing and screening the content, each in a separate way. The head honcho of the growing entertainment house commented on the Indian nature of the fim industry and its aspirations and necessities to get to the global standards that are set by the few English movies that sell well in India. Mr. Arjun proved to be very popular amongst a rapt crowd, who questioned him on all issues from the salaries of film stars to the minute details of production to the 3D and 6D experiences. If anyone doubted a growing India’s tendency to get stuck into their entertainment, here was the dispeller.
Addict – Day 2
The second day of Intaglio 2008-09 saw an extremely popular and innovative hands on marketing event as a part of the expo Selling Point. The participants were given a budget of around Rs. 2000 and asked to develop a catchy Below-The-Line (BTL) campaign for one of the given product categories: Hair Care, Oral Care, Body Care, Male Grooming 
Products and Great Value Products. The campaigns were meant to target the student participants at Intaglio, the consumer segment which the event partner Amway sees at matching its long term consumer profile. The teams came up with several innovative solutions to involve the audience and make them sample and in some cases even buy the products in their stalls, with one team going as far as to offer professional manicure and head massage in return for trying a hair oil. The participants were judged by Prof. Prashant Mishra, PGP Chairman IIM Calcutta and senior Prof. in Marketing. Prof. Mishra commented that it was heartening to see the students come up with breakthrough promotional campaigns to escape from the advertising clutter around them.
Reverberations – Mr Sabyasachi Hajara, CMD, SCI
In the second session of Reverberations – the lecture series, the student community from top management schools had an illuminating session with Mr. Sabyasachi Hajara, the Chairman of Shipping Corporation of India. Nostalgia, experience, advice and information – Mr. Hajara’s address had it all and the huge audience listened, captivated. And when it came to the interaction part – there were questions aplenty, asked with curiosity and answered with wisdom.
Mr. Hajara started his address by recounting his days as a management student. The fact that he also happens to be an alumnus of IIM Calcutta added to the nostalgia. Offering a glimpse into his student days, he shared his interactions with teachers and took the audience on an informative trip down the memory-lane. As Mr. Hajara is the current chairman of a “Navratna†PSU, the talk was bound to come around the topic of public sector and its role in Indian economy. It came sooner than later and thanks to his 32 years of experience in the public sector, Mr. Hajara enlightened the audience with deep insights into the making, functioning and growth of the PSU’s. His knowledgeable speak also helped clear many apparent misconceptions that some of the students had about the public sector. Talking about decision making, he reminded that barring a few notable exceptions (like L & T) almost all the private sector companies were promoter driven and hence the decision making process was far more centralized in the private sector companies as compared to public sector companies. He also drew attention to the fact that leading public sector companies have been the breeding ground for the best managers of the country who currently call the shots in both private and public sector as the most successful professionals.
Being an expert of the shipping sector, he also talked about the structure and prospects of shipping industry in general and SCI in particular. Tackling questions from a whole gamut of subjects like the Sethusamudram Project, the impact of inflation on shipping industry and the managerial challenges of leading a PSU he enthralled the audience by his wisdom and insights.
Pixelated Chaos
Taking place for the very first time was IIM Calcutta’s own Game theory and Treasure hunt event. The two rounds of the game, both held on campus saw great participation from different colleges. The game began with students deciphering 
clues, which would lead them to various locations. At these locations the participants had to give out the answer to a key, also in the form of a puzzle. There was a buzz in the campus as people rushed all around looking for the ‘right places’ to visit.
After four rounds of translating messages and reaching all the locations, the contestants found out the journey was only half over. Their rewards for reaching the various locations were yet again clues which would lead one final team to the final location with the password in hand, however this time there was another twist in the tale. No team had enough clues to crack the answer on their own, and so came the most important lesson about ‘Fruitful Collusion’. All the teams looked to form partnerships which would benefit them, but there was an aura of mystery in the room with no one knowing what the other was planning.
As the teams decoded the answers and formed the final passkey, waiting to run the final leg of this mental obstacle course, the organizers looked happily at a game gone well, which had transformed this serene IIM Calcutta campus into a hotbed of activity.
Intaglio-Red FM talk show
The third day of Intaglio witnessed an enthusiastic student community expressing itself candidly about the current Media and its impact on the society. In a talk show organized by Intaglio in partnership with Red FM, participants from various 
B-schools delved deeper into the topic “Media reflects the societyâ€. Speaking about the topic, Akshay Lal, a second year PGDM student from IIM Calcutta said that social reflections were found in works of art and media was rather supposed to be an information broadcasting mechanism. That it has lost much of its objectivity is a subject of regret and should be corrected by media itself. While many participants felt that media has done a wonderful job in terms of increasing activism among citizens and promoting civil vigilantism, they also felt that the media needed to restrain itself on controversial topics. While the show helped participants raise many questions and approach many plausible solutions to the issue, some cool Red FM merchandise acted as an icing on the intellectual cake. The show was moderated by Jimmy Tangree, station head of Red FM Kolkata.
Pro-Nite (“Fifth Dimensionâ€)
Regalio concluded Day 2 of Intaglio, with a pronite that featured popular Calcutta band Fifth Dimension. The five-member band entertained the audience at the auditorium with both Hindi and English numbers. Apart from the usual songs, the band also displayed the individual talents of the members with scintillating solos by the drummer, the keyboardist and the bass guitarist. The crowd, having thoroughly enjoyed the English vocalist’s rendition of songs by artists as diverse as the Scorpions, Bryan Adams and Santana, shouted for an encore.
January 21st, 2009 at 3:55 am
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January 21st, 2009 at 4:00 am
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