The inaugural session was graced by the Honourable Finance Minister Smt. Nirmala Sitharaman, along with Dr Deepak Mishra, Director and Chief Executive, ICRIER, and Dr Ashok Gulati, Infosys Chair Professor of Agriculture, ICRIER.

The post lunch session had another panel discussion on the theme of taming inflation in India moderated by Ms. Mythili Bhusnurmuth, senior advisor, NCAER. The other participants included Dr Sitikanta Pattanaik, Executive Director, RBI; Dr Dharmadhikari Joshi, Chief Economist, CRISIL; Dr Ashima Goyal, Emeritus Professor, IGIDR.

With the multifaceted deliberations on the all-important topic drawing to a close, it was time for Dr Gulati to deliver the final Vote of Thanks. The gathered research and academic community has a lot to think about after the enlightening interactions with the assembled experts.

40 PGDM (2022-24) Batch students along with management faculty members Dr. Rajeev Johari and Dr. Indraneel Mandal attend the event.

The seminar focused on Investor Awareness and Protection. The programme started at 10.00 AM with lamp lighting and welcome address by Dr Mridul Saggar, IEPF Chair Professor, NCAER. The dignitaries of the dias were Ms. Anita Shah Kella , CEO of IEPFA, M R Shrikant from RBI, Mr. Giriraj Prasad Garg (SEBI), Mr. KPS Malhotra (IFSO), Mr. Jayant Kumar Dash (RBI), Mr. Rakesh Jain (IEPFA), Mr. Tushar Anand (IEPFA), Mr. Mridul (NCAER).

The house was then thrown open for the Q&A session. Some very pertinent questions were put up by the students present, which were then answered with care and patience by the panelists, thus adding substantially to the. All in all, it turned out to be the perfect conclusion to the day’s deliberations. The entire seminar was well conducted and the message conveyed was very specific, which was greatly appreciated. 

The theme of the conference was “Current Trends in Multidisciplinary Research” The session was on 17th July’ 2022.  (1.00 pm onwards). The objective of the conference was to provide a common platform for researchers from the Academia as well as the Industry to discuss and present their research work by providing an opportunity for collaboration among them. Various research papers on the above mentioned theme were presented in the conference. The papers were presented by academicians, Research scholars, and Executives from industry in different areas from different parts of the world, Ethiopia, Indonesia to name a few. Overall the session was more on the research papers dealing with real problems and scenario in multidisciplinary areas. It was a rich learning opportunity for the participants and all. The interactive nature of the session further added great learning. The feedback was given to the participants on one to one basis along with suggestions for continuing their research in their area of interest. At last the concluding remark and best wishes was given to all participants for their research in future. Overall the experience was enriching and overwhelming.

The focus of the conclave was on the fact that for too long technical education in this country has been conducted in English and the time may have finally come for moving over to various Indian languages which can make it easier for the students to both understand and express themselves.

The dignitaries gracing the occasion included Shri Anil Sahasrabudhdhe, Chairman of the AICTE; Shri Chamukrishna Shashtri, Chairman of the High Powered Committee on the Promotion of Indian Languages, Ministry of Education, Government of India; Shri Santosh Kumar Taneja from the Sankalp Foundation Trust; Director of the Faculty Development Cell of the AICTE; and Shri Rajeev Mahajan, Member Secretary of the AICTE; Prof. M.P.Bhunia, Vice Chairman of the AICTE. Each of them offered their considered thoughts on different aspects of this mammoth project.

The conclave saw participation by several heads of institutions of colleges and universities from across the country, several of whom were felicitated for their contribution in popularising technical education in local languages. Over a thousand participants joined the conclave online from various parts of the nation. A few students were invited to share their experiences in learning in languages like Marathi, Hindi and Telugu.

It turned out to be an inspiring exchange of minds as all agreed on the significance of diversifying technical education in the vast repository of languages in a country like India.

The conclave facilitated deliberations around the theme “India@75- Being Diverse, Inclusive and Better for all” by senior representatives, Industry leaders, policy influencers, professionals, CHROs, CSOs and various D&I experts from India and abroad. 

With 75 years of India’s independence, we cannot afford to exclude vulnerable sections of the society from the mainstream economy. We want to make every effort possible to ensure that all the diverse sections of the society- women, persons with disability, LGBTQ+ community and others are included in all aspects- be it education, digital, financial, employment, culture or society; leaving no one behind.  Through this conclave FICCI endeavours to ensure that Indian corporate have inclusive organizational policies in their companies with enough gender diversity, inclusion of people with disabilities as well as representation from the LGBTQI+ community.

The conclave was address by Keshav Suri, Co-Chair, FICCI Task Force on D&I, Executive Director, The Lalit Suri Hospitality, Sanjiv Mehta, President,  FICCI and CEO & Managing Director, Hindustan Unilever  Limited (HUL), Suhas Lalinakere Yathiraj, District Magistrate, Gautam Buddha Nagar, Rekha M. Menon, Chairperson and Senior Managing Director, Accenture India and many more. 

On day one, the program started at 10:00 am with inaugural session. Mr. Deepak Sood, Secretary General Assocham, delivered the welcome address and gave briefings of the entire program. He also greeted the speakers, delegates and audience of the program. Mr. Ram Rakkappan, Chairperson, Assocham National Fintech Council, discussed the importance of fintech festival for inclusive and sustainable growth of industries and startups in his chairperson address. In industry address, Mr. Ambarish Kenghe, VP Product, Google Pay, elaborated the use and importance of fintech in digital wallet platform and online payment system. Mr. Mihir Gandhi, Partner and Leader Payment Transformations, PWC, emphasised on the importance of fintech in various industries, challenges and technological developments in fintech while delivering theme address. Just after that Assocham PWC report has been launched. In different industry addresses, Mr. Dharmender Jhamb,VP, Paytm and Mr. Nikhil Sahany, Divisional President, South Asia and Country Corporate Officer, India, Mastercard discussed the significance of technological advancements and their implementations in business growth. In the address of chief guest, Shri Pankaj Chaudhary, Hon’ble Minister of State, Ministry of Finance, Government of India discussed the emphasis, programs and schemes of government India for the promotion and development of fintech for social and economic welfare. A fireside chat was commenced after that with Dr. Saurabh Garg, CEO, UIDAI. Mr. Suvendu Pati, Chief General Manager, RBI delivered the keynote address and discussed the growth patterns at various areas due to fintech and technological advancements. In industry addresses, the representatives of PayU and Assocham disseminated the adoption of fintech in their business models. Mr. Sudiip K. Goswami, Director and GM –South India & Start-ups, Dell Technologies discussed various technological developments in the area of fintech. Three presentations on fintech and its impact on the growth of businesses of CredAvenue, BharatPe and Cashfree Payments were made by top management representatives of these companies. In technical session one, representatives of government of India and industries participated and emphasised on the need, threats, solutions related to fintech to reshape digital financial services.

Day two commenced with welcome address of Mr. Deepak Sood, Secretary General Assocham. Dr. Anantha Nageswaran, Chief Economic Advisor, Ministry of Finance, Government of India delivered keynote address. In his address he presented global growth of fintech, fintech growth in India, exponential growth in digital mode of payment in last few years, drivers of fintech growth etc. In the special session senior representatives of PolicyBazar, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance, Edelweiss Tokio Life Insurance, RenewBuy and PwC participated as panelists and discussed the growth of insurance sector due to different innovative technologies related to fintech. They discussed about speedy cashless settlement of insurance claims have been possible due to fintech. Insurance aggregators business and its dependence on fintech has also been discussed in this session. In CEOs Panel, CEOs and cofounders of various industries such as PayTM, Spice money, Cashfree Payments, Assocham National Council on Banking discussed the importance of fintech in business development in urban and rural areas. Mr. Vikas Verma, COO, South Asia,  Mastercard delivered a keynote address on importance of fintech in debit and credit card related businesses.

In a workshop on Finsec- Securing Financial Transactions, Panelists from NIC, Assocham National Council of Cyber security, SWIFT SC, Visa and Mastercard put the focus on cyber frauds, malwares for data theft etc and discussed the techniques and way outs to have safe financial transactions online. In a industry address Mr. Rounak Maheshwari, ED, Extreme Internet Exchange elaborated the business model of largest internet exchange in India. In the featured session a panelists of Perfios, Cashfree Payments, FACE, Rupifi and Spice Money made deliberations on role of fintech in financial inclusion and India stack success story. In the last special session of the day, panelists discussed the need and importance of streamlining digital payments for Indian consumers.

 The third day of the India International Fintech Festival was commenced by plenary session in which welcome address was delivered by Mr. Ram Rakkappan, Chairperson, Assocham National Fintech council. In his address he discussed the importance of fintech for service and financial organizations. In the industry address, Ms. Medha Girotra, Co-Chairperson Assocham National Fintech council addressed the gathering about the role of the fintech in sustainable growth. The fintech excellence award ceremony was performed and awards were distributed to the winners. In the panel discussion, leading management executives of  Micrsoft, Dell Tecnologies, Extreme Internet exchange, Microhost and PWC exchanged their views on implementing most creative digital solutions for fintech domain. They discussed emerging technologies such as quantum, AI, cloud, 5G, IOT and AR/VR and their roles in Fintech. Mr. Arpit Sharma, VP, BFSI discussed the role of modern technologies in Fintech. In two keynote addresses emphasis was made on adoption of modern technologies and their implementation issues in the industries. In the special session for women, top management executives of Visa, American Express, Ikigai Law, NPCI, WhatsApp discussed the role of women in financial sector.

This has been a wonderful learning and networking experience and interactions with corporate people and shared the views on various themes related to Fintech.    

 Online Faculty Development Program (Workshop) on "Inculcating Universal Human Values in Education”. The program was organized under the series of Value Education cell, AICTE. The objective of the program was to make participants aware and enrich the with need of value education and their holistic development.

The Faculty Development Program focused on the ways to propagate human values to the student fraternity through faculty and thus creating sensitization amongst students for a better, value driven behaviour and self-development.

The sessions were full of enthusiasm and self-exploration along with fruitful learning.

The FDP was very informative and discussed about the knowledge of contemporary developments that are taking place in various dimensions of research to enhance the abilities of participants to carry out independent research, successful research projects and finally to enable them for technical communication national, international journals/conferences. The entire FDP was focused upon fundamentals aspects of relevant research topic selection, literature review, research proposals writing, Data Analysis & Interpretation and writing a quality research paper. The sessions were conducted by eminent experts as resource persons.

The participants also learned through hand-on practices to enable and write the content methodologically. It was full of learning to use the research tools and helps educators in research and enriches learning experiences.