IIM-Calcutta fills director’s post after 5 months with a faculty member – Times of India

Kolkata: The Indian Institute of Management Calcutta has appointed a director after a gap of five months.
Uttam Kumar Sarkar, who took charge on Wednesday, has been associated with the institute for two-and-a-half decades. Sarkar succeeds Anju Seth who resigned in rather unfortunate circumstances in March following irreconcilable differences with the institute’s board of directors and members of the faculty. Dean of external relations Prashant Mishra has been heading the institute in the interim period.

Unlike Seth, who was at the Pamplin College of Business at Virginia Tech before joining IIM-C in 2018, Sarkar has been a faculty member at the institute in three stints — first between 1997 and 2000, then 2002 to 2006 and finally from 2008 onwards.
He has been teaching management information systems. Between 2015 and 2018, he was also dean of new initiatives and external relations at the institute.
Sarkar has also been a visiting professor at the University of Miami, Florida. Between 1990 and 1995, he was lecturer in the department of computer science and engineering at Jadavpur University.
An alumnus of Ramakrishna Mission Residential College Narendrapur, he did his BTech, MTech and PhD in computer science and engineering from IIT Kharagpur. He is a leading researcher in the field of information systems with numerous publications in prestigious international journals to his credit.
Congratulating Sarkar, IIM-C board of governors chairperson Shrikrishna Kulkarni said, “Professor Sarkar knows IIM Calcutta intimately, its history, culture and the aspirations of its large body of faculty, students, alumni, staff, board, and all stakeholders. Moreover, he is aware of what needs to be done and how it must be done to help IIM Calcutta achieve its global aspirations.”
Sarkar said it was a happy moment for IIM Calcutta fraternity. “The institute is poised to take a big leap forward towards excellence. It’s an honour to take the leadership position of this great institute,” he added.
His task is cut out to guide the institute forward after the rather tumultuous tenure of Seth who departed almost a year before her tenure was to end.
She had put in her papers in March-end in the backdrop of a full-blown confrontation between her and the chairperson of IIM-C.
Tensions had first stirred in December when over 75% of the faculty wrote to the education secretary, expressing grave concerns about the state of affairs at the institute citing Seth’s “arbitrary and discriminatory” style of functioning and alleged she had “a very narrow vision”.
The matter had escalated on March 4, after the board of governors at IIM-C passed a resolution against Seth and divested her of the powers to make appointments and take disciplinary action.