THE HEADS KEEP ROLLING

Is a clash between its directors and the board of governors taking a toll on the venerable Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs)? If recent events at IIM Calcutta are to be taken at face value, that question is merely rhetorical.

- Jumana Shah

The institute, one of the premier showpieces of the IIM brand, has changed directors three times in three years and is on the lookout for a fourth. The institute’s first woman director, Anju Seth, resigned in March 2021, three years into her five-year term; her successor, Uttam Kumar Sarkar, lasted a little over two years, quitting in August 2023; and the most recent incumbent, Sahadeb Sarkar, who had taken over as director-in-charge only in November 2023 and was to have served at the post till the appointment of a regular director, also exited this January. As a stopgap arrangement, IIM-C has appointed Professor Saibal Chattopadhyay as in-charge director, but the process of appointing a new full-time head is underway.

What explains this spate of exits? Sahadeb, who had joined IIM-C in 1997 and had previously taught at the Oklahoma State University in the US and had also been a visiting professor at the University of Louisiana, is said to have been removed following allegations of sexual harassment against him, which sources say predate his appointment but for which a complaint was filed only recently and an inquiry is in process. But the departure of his predecessors also suggests deeper forces at play.

THE INTERPRETATION BY THE DIRECTOR AND THE BOARD OF GOVERNORS OF THEIR RESPECTIVE ROLES IS WHAT LED TO THE CONFLICT AT IIM-C, ACCORDING TO SOURCES