INTRODUCING THE IIMA ENDOWMENT FUND

– Chhavi Moodgal (PGP 2004), CEO – IIMA Endowment Fund

Educational institutions can last for generations – Takshashila and Nalanda Universities were citadels of academic excellence for over 700 years; European academic institutions like Oxford and Cambridge set up as far back as 1096 and 1209 AD continue to be relevant even now. Fortified with financial independence, academic institutions can essentially last in perpetuity!

Endowments provide a long-term and predictable source of funding to an educational institute, which can help pave the way for its multi-generational sustainability. Endowments benefit the institution since they provide fiscal independence, enhanced prestige while creating avenues for reconnecting not only with the alumni but the community at large.

Giving back through the endowment is equally relevant to the donors since their contributions help in making a positive impact on the society and creating a sense of legacy-building. As an added bonus, these donations are also tax exempt.

The IIM Ahmedabad Endowment Fund was launched in June 2020 with an initial commitment of INR 100 crore by 10 IIMA alumni, with an intent of Giving Back and supporting IIMA in its future endeavours. Since then, more individuals have become associated with the Endowment Fund. The PGP batch of 1990 has become the first batch to contribute to the Institute through the Endowment Fund.

The Endowment Fund will support the Institute in achieving its strategic objectives – helping it make an even larger impact in the field of education, entrepreneurial leadership, management practice, and public policy. The vision of the Endowment Fund is to provide long term financial autonomy to the Institute; with the medium-term objective of growing the corpus to INR 1000 crore in 5 years. This would place IIMA on the path similar to that of leading global business schools, which have raised billions of dollars in their endowments, powered by their alumni. In India, IIMA is the first management institute to come up with such an initiative.

Consistently ranked among the top business schools in India, our Alma Mater is a destination of choice for business school aspirants across the country and region. Over the last few months, the Institute has drafted its 2025 strategy, in consultation with McKinsey, containing 10 big moves to strengthen different dimensions of the Institute’s mission: students, faculty, program portfolio and research output. These moves will enable the Institute to overcome existing challenges and enhance performance on critical parameters – thus leapfrogging both regional and global peers in business school rankings. Some of these priorities include – recruitment and retention of world class faculty, fostering high quality research, nurture student diversity, expanding program support and providing the appropriate organisational support and physical infrastructure to support these activities. 

Under the guidance of the IIMA Board of Governors, the IIMA Endowment Fund is governed by its own Bye-Laws and is managed by an independent Endowment Board consisting of initial alumni contributors and the Director and Dean (Alumni and External Relations) of IIMA. The Endowment Board oversees the key activities related to the Endowment Fund through the “IIMA Ahmedabad Endowment Management Foundation”.  The foundation itself is a Section 8 (Not for Profit) company and provides services such as corpus building, advice on deployment and investment management of the Endowment Fund to the Institute. 

Over last few decades, IIMA has led the way in the country and the region in the domain of management education. Through the Endowment Fund, we hope to support the Institute in continuing this for the centuries to come!

For any queries related to the Endowment Fund, please feel free to write to me at endowment@iima.ac.in.