Shortage of staff is a growing concern for India’s top public business schools, according to the director of a leading institution.

Himanshu Rai, director of the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Indore, said recruiting both domestic and international faculty was a key challenge for his institution.

“We need more and more faculty members and it’s always a challenge because the PhD programmes in India, they are still evolving,” he said. “We need stronger PhD programmes so that there’s a greater supply of faculty.”

Rai, who has led the institution since 2018, said IIM Indore currently has about 100 PhD students “but even that is not enough”.

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“The second challenge that we face is getting international faculty,” he added. Although IIMs have some autonomy, they are limited by government pay scales, meaning they can struggle to match private sector and international salaries, making it harder to attract quality faculty.

The first generation of IIMs was set up in the 1960s under India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, at the same time as the Indian Institutes of Technology, to offer management and business education.

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Demand for such programmes has grown in India in recent years. In 2023, the number of students registering for the CAT – a national exam to secure admission to the IIMs and certain other management schools – increased by to 330,000 compared with the previous year.

However, it is notoriously hard to secure a place at an IIM. Between all 21 of them, there are roughly 5,000 seats. Even counting India’s high-quality, private business schools, demand far outstrips supply, leading many Indians to head abroad for business education instead.

According to , in 2021, business and management was the most popular field of study for Indians in the UK, with 44 per cent enrolling in related courses.

“We are limited in terms of really scaling up,” said Rai. “Within an IIM, I do have limitations in terms of the number of seats that I can offer purely because the brick and mortar model is still something that the students prefer when it comes to a regular MBA.”

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IIM Indore is currently in the midst of a 4.3 billion rupee (£40 million) expansion project that will include a new academic building and an incubation centre, as well as more accommodation for students and faculty. Once this work has been completed, Rai hopes to increase the number of seats at the institution by 20 per cent.

The Indian government has also invested more in opening new IIMs in recent years, including seven under prime minister Narendra Modi’s government.

Despite their popularity, Rai believes IIMs should avoid complacency, particularly when it comes to internationalisation.

“We always looked inwards, thinking that nothing can affect us,” he said. But, he continued, that has changed as these institutes increasingly see themselves – and the nation as a whole – in the context of their place on the global stage.

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“We realised that there is value if you look outwards, if you talk to your peers, because you can always improve.

“And given that India is now the largest country in terms of population, not only is it the world’s biggest market, but it is also the world’s biggest resource. And if we are the world’s biggest resource, then it is our duty to make sure that the education that we impart is also international in nature as well, and not just national.”

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helen.packer@timeshighereducation.com