Management Development Institute PGDM Review By Ashish Kaushik

MDI Gurgaon is one of the oldest private B-Schools in India. The College has made many entrepreneurs in its 50 years of experience. The pedigree is so strong that some companies like Goldman Sachs and American Express have been hiring students from here since they started their operations in India. The reason is that finance students are ready to serve the investment banking business. There have been many notable alumni of MDI Gurgaon and one is famous Novelist Durjoy Datta who started his career as an investment banker before turning into a writer. The management of the College is so supportive, once your name is on the final list after clearing all rounds, you will be assisted in every step to finish the admission formalities. Lastly, the thing for which we all went to MDI Gurgaon is the placements and they are the second-best thing.

Everything at MDI Gurgaon runs with a timeline as the lectures were always on time. The time that we had to spend at the Library Greens was fixed because the hunch of academics at the College was more or less the same for the entire two years. All the demographics of finance which wasn’t my stronghold until I joined MDI were taught so crisply that I felt like I belong here. As a student, there was so much to learn here. HBR case studies of top quality were referred to us as the institute believes in making the students better than the best.

To teach 240 students there were 70+ faculties and some of them used to stay at the campus. On-demand there was an open lecture hall on the campus and at night before any semester, the area was kept busy as students would urge the faculties to take some extra classes. Faculties never bogged down to any such demands. Most MDI faculties were research scholars so questioning their knowledge would be a brave thing to do. The faculties treated every single student as an adult because they never repeated the same things to a student. If a student is wise, would know where he/she is wrong. Thus, the faculty spoke less, but in short, explained to us what mistakes we are making and how we can rectify those.

I am not defending MDI but the placements of MDI are better than the newly established IIMs. It’s the strength of the batch that has played a key role in getting students placed. Strength is so low and the number of companies that visit the placement drive is so high that getting just a single offer is like we have underperformed. I can’t exactly remember the total companies that came but for the Finance domain around 4-5, FIIs firms and 10-12 banks showed interest. In short, roughly 15 companies get 60 students from the campus. Thus, the students of MDI are always in demand as the companies wish that they could hire more. So, the final inference is that you don’t have to worry at all because you will have an offer of 10 lakhs and above if you are average and brilliant at the same time, you might get a multi-bagging job worth 30-40 lakhs or more.

If I go in hierarchical order, the hostels would be defined as the Kshitij Hostel, Bat City (Takshashila Hostel), which is known as Bat city as various Bats reside in that hostel building and lastly Dharavi (Change Masters). The last one I have called Dharavi as it was like a slum in comparison to the other two hostels. There was a rule that students had to enter the hostel as late as 11 pm but who cared at least on 2 occasions in a week, we came at 5 am and the guards happily opened the doors for us.

For competitions and all, we were sent to XLRI, and IIM Bangalore. So, I will share the things that we had and didn’t. Our campus size was bigger than both. Yes, only 1/3rd of the MDI campus is operational but if I consider the entire area that the College has it is more than the other two Colleges. Even the IIM student who came to our campus has said that the management library of MDI which is called Greens is the best in India. There was a mini-golf course on the campus and three-night canteens which no other campus has. The common facilities, if I have to mention them, were a recreation room with Billiards tables, table tennis tables, badminton court, auditoriums, and a TV lounge.

I know some students who didn’t even step out of the campus for weeks. Not because the campus had adequate facilities but because the campus was so addictive that even after roaming around, we couldn’t find a better place than the MDI campus in Gurgaon.