A report has suggested that it is likely that British students considering taking MBA courses in the UK will find it increasingly hard to find loans to cover the cost of their post-graduate studies.

According to a report in the Financial Times, the appeal of MBA courses in the US had recently been increasing among British students, thanks to the weak dollar.

However, the paper has now learnt that the credit crunch has dramatically reduced the number of student loans available for those considering such post-graduate courses.

It pointed to research carried out by the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators that showed that 50 lenders have suspended their post-graduate student loan deals.

“The cost of loan repayment is particularly high for students from outside the US who apply for loans from US institutions,” the paper explained.

“This is because credit references are not required and also the lenders find it harder to track down students on graduation if they return to their home countries.”

As a result, a British student looking for a post-graduate student loan in the US can expect to have to pay interest of around seven per cent.

With US MBA courses typically costing around $150,000 (£75,000) to complete, the rising price of loans could put many British students off, even though they know they will be able to secure high-paying jobs after graduation.

Source : gaapweb.com

Aaron F. Cooper II, a self-described worrywart, never thought his penchant for devising foolproof backup plans could translate into a calling. But that all changed when he signed up for an elective in risk management while at the University of Georgia’s Terry School of Business executive MBA program last fall. “It entails pretty much everything I’ve always been interested in my entire life, even before I knew risk management existed,” said Cooper, 27, a telecommunications engineer at AT&T (T).

Cooper is part of a new wave of students hitting business school campuses. For years, risk management—the process of analyzing exposure to risk and determining how best to handle it—occupied a sleepy corner in business schools, a subject mainly of interest to those who want to enter the insurance field. But with the recent turmoil in the financial markets and a push for more accountability, risk management has rocketed in status at business schools.

In the past decade, a growing number of B-schools have added concentrations in the subject, ramping up the number of classes they offer. Executive MBA programs are also incorporating risk management electives into their curriculum, responding to increased demand from executives and companies. In some instances, schools such as Georgia’s Terry are developing custom programs on the topic for top executives and boards of directors.

More : businessweek.com

B-Schools are increasingly roping in a number of younger and lesser-experienced MBA aspirants.Ross Geraghty delves deeper into this trend while mentioning that it is still advisable to gain considerable work experience before enrolling for a business programme.

Unlike for most educational courses, for an admission to an MBA course,a minimum of three years of work experience in a managerial role is crucial. This figure can be higher in some cases.

In rare cases will a institute accept recent graduates. This, too, is done for exceptionally talented students.

More : economictimes.indiatimes.com

Pune, May 14: “ You want to play truant - It’s fine.”

This position has been hard Symbiosis Institute of Business Management (SIBM). He proposed a powerful sum of more than 50 years, MBA final MPM and students, who are not their mandate, will not be granted, and the lot is not unlucky for the situation seem to be the examinations from May 16.

When contacted SIBM director PraMod Dr Kumar admitted that fines ranging from 1000 to 3500 RS has been established. “ If students internships to ensure the participation they stop classes and to ensure, academic standards, the fine is a deterrent for the future for the treatment of the lot is not easy semester,”he averred.

Last year MBA II and III MPM students were shocked to learn the fine was on the board, on May 9. The fines were imposed in consideration of the cumulative participation from January to April. Students with a number of participants is less than 50 per cent of a fine, R 3500, while those with a number of participants between 50 and 60 per cent up coughing R 2000. Students with a number of participants between 60 and 70 per cent of the fine of Rs 1000

While disadvantaged students have a written complaint to the University of Pune authorities, on condition of anonymity, she déliré about the injustice of the fine. In its memorandum to the university, students have said that fixing fines against it was an aberration, inhuman and cruel in order to collect money under the pretext of lack of participation.

They calculated that the whole system of marking attendance was wrong and, although first a list of more than 90 students April was the final list of entries to 50 odd students. In highlighting the differences between the two lists, students have reported instances where a student, even if the USA, it was revealed that 26.67 percent attendance. Similarly, in the case of other students leave school during the first half, and not reporting for other classes, it was 9.38 percent a presence.

NOW that the IIMs have more or less ruled out a legal recourse against the HRD Ministry’s directive to impose a fee cut in their PGP (Post-Graduate Programmes) courses, the country’s premier business schools are busy considering various options to make up for this revenue loss.

“One of the options before us is to increase the number of Management Development Programmes (MDPs),” said Prof Prakash G. Apte, Director, Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore.

In an exclusive interview with Business Line today, he said that the board of governors would meet in the next four days. “IIM-Bangalore will work out its finances then. We have not yet received the break-up for the planned and non-planned grants.”

But would increasing the number of management development programmes not impose a huge load on the already over-burdened professors who are handling various PG courses, executive education programmes and consultancy assignments?

(IIM-Bangalore, for instance, has about 70 professors for 700 students (400 in the PGP, 300 in the PGP in Software Management and 40 PhD students) and this year, the institute has conducted about 45 MDPs.)

Prof Apte said that they might even consider reducing the number of offerings for the students so that more staff time is available for corporate training programmes.

On whether the institute would recruit more teachers, he said: “Yes, that would be one option,” but expressed doubt about finding the right kind of talent in the industry.

But this too would require Government permission. And what about additional funds for the salaries? With the cut in allocation in this year’s Interim Budget - from Rs 79.73 crore last year to Rs 45 crore in 2004-05 - the IIMs would have to tread this path carefully.

Meanwhile, the Government is also insisting that the IIMs increase intake of students.

This might be one way of boosting their revenues, but Prof Apte said: “We can take about 40 more students, provided we have the right infrastructure like hostel rooms, mess, etc.”

Looking merely at direct taxes, it is often suggested that India is an under-taxed nation. This, says R. Vaidyanathan, does not take into account the speed money paid for government service. This rent-seeking makes the nation high-taxed.

THERE is a view among some experts that India is an under-taxed economy. Many a time Finance Ministers believe in this and exhort people to pay their dues.

Advertisements are issued to induce people to pay taxes and novel schemes are suggested before every Budget to augment government revenues. One of the common arguments is based on the share of taxes to GDP and it is suggested that it can be much higher. Another is in terms of the composition of the taxes - direct and indirect - and it is suggested that the latter, which are regressive, are larger share of the pool.

Table 1 gives the share of taxes to GDP for select years from 1991. The share of taxes, both direct and indirect, has been around 15 per cent of GDP in the last decade and half. The share of indirect taxes was of the order of 11.5 per cent and that of direct taxes 3.6 per cent.

Based on this data of direct taxes to GDP of nearly 4 per cent, many experts, particularly of the Left persuasion, argue that we are a under-taxed nation from the view of the direct taxes. But, as we will show, they do not take in to account the payment to be made to government employees (variously called bribe, rent seeking, speed money, lubrication, etc.) for carrying on any activity and to that extent the total taxes are much higher than reflected.

Table 2 gives the level and composition of taxes of both Central and State governments in the last decade. A slight shift in the proportion of direct taxes from 1991 to 2003 is seen. It has gone up from 14 per cent of all taxes to nearly 24 per cent during this period when the proportion of the indirect taxes came down from 86 per cent to 76 per cent.

A substantial drop is seen in the Customs duties due to our international commitments. Excise duties declined from 28 per cent to 23 per cent during 1991 to 1996 and by a similar magnitude later. The share of personal income-tax showed an increase from 6.6 per cent to 9.9 per cent. As personal income-taxes and excise duties are shared with State governments, there is no enthusiasm for the Centre to reform them.

The aggregate taxes do not reveal the full picture of evasion and coverage. Table 3 provides the number of returns filed by salaried and non-salaried persons in 1999-2000 according to the I-T Department.

It says that there were no salaried persons earning more than Rs 1 crore annually and in all only 200 persons above Rs 25-lakh. In the case of self-employed, the number is around 900 in the Rs 25-lakh category with none in the Rs 50-100-lakh category.

From Table-3, it looks as if a relief fund should be created for all our top film-stars, cricket players, surgeons, lawyers, chartered accountants, architects, tax consultants and other self-employed persons. They all seem to be in distress!

Table 4 provides the number of returns from some categories of services as published by the I-T Department. The numbers speak volumes about the coverage and the nature of underlying collections.

The whole country there are apparently only 10,539 utensil and 5477 furniture shops in the taxable category. Pinch yourself.

Immediately the argument will be to strengthen, enhance, improve and network the I-T Department. The issue is not that. It is much more serious and cancerous. If you visit the Postal Department officers’ quarters in, say, Mumbai you will find mostly cycles and scooters.

But if you visit the residential quarters of the staff of Direct or Indirect Tax Department, you may find expensive cars parked there. That should provide clues to the issues facing us.

At the same time we find that the income of government employees rising faster than the inflation rate in the last thirty years.

Table 5 provides the increase in salaries of public sector employees in relation to inflation. The emoluments have risen 3610 per cent from 1971-72 to 2000-01 when the Consumer Price Index climbed 1440 per cent. This implies the public sector employees are net gainers with their real income well protected.

Hence decline in the real income cannot be a reason, if at all it is justifiable, for rent seeking from ordinary citizens.

The biggest carmaker, General Motors, India’s capital was head hunted silicon, which offers a lot of 2005 on the conclusion of the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore - Shanghai China a detachment of its establishment.

It is a unique double for the institute, which since the existence of the last three decades. While the GM head hunting is probably fairly well, it is perhaps for the first time that the Middle Kingdom would be the best after a taste of India’s most prestigious B-schools.

Turning to the figures. Against five companies during the year 2004 for the location zero (the first day of qualifying period), the number this year is almost three times. The newcomer to this year are HSBC, British Petroleum, Barclays, General Motors and Bank of America.

The list of companies in 2005 to zero Slot Board consists of three companies - McKinsey, Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and AT Kearney.

Said Gauri Gupta of BCG: “The 2005 is well on track, particularly in analytical representation of a high degree of maturity.”

Other hirers contain a mixture of investment banks and industrial products.

Officials, which provides details have not yet been calculated, but seemed confident that these would be higher than those of 2004.

While Capital One has leased for New York, British Petroleum, it is anticipated that the supply of Singapore. HSBC is the attitude of New York, London and Hong Kong, while Deutsche Bank would recall staff to London.

One of the biggest banks in France, BNP recruitment, London, Singapore, Hong Kong and Tokyo.

The second day of negotiations, it is the turn of the usual suspects-FMCG majors like HLL and P & G. In addition to these two Citibank is also the second day, which is also the National Kidney Foundation, Singapore.

Under pressure from local industrialists who fear they are losing out to foreign competition, the Indian government is reviewing a number of free-trade pacts, including those pending with Thailand and Asean.

“Bilateral agreements having divergent standards with different countries may not help India remain competitive in the international market,” said R.V. Kanoria, a international trade expert with the Confederation of Indian Industry, a New Dehli-based trade group.

“Liberalisation of tariffs by the Indian government should be calibrated with internal reforms in labour, infrastructure and agriculture,” he said in an interview with the Bangkok Post.

In October 2003, India signed a signed a limited trade deal with Thailand that came into effect in September 2004. Under the so-called “early-harvest” agreement, which expires in 2008, Indian and Thai firms can freely import and export 82 items. The deal calls for tariffs to be reduced by 50 percent in 2004-05, 75 percent in 2005 and 100 percent in 2006.

Bilateral trade in these 82 items consequently doubled to US$430 million in 2005 from $217 million in 2004, with Thailand recording a trade surplus of $253 million.

The lopsided numbers soured the Indian business community, particularly the automotive components makers, and talks on a more comprehensive deal that would cover thousands of items has since stalled. Recently CII said it was working to modify existing FTAs and implement a new set of industry recommendations for future trade deals, while claiming that multilateral agreements under the World Trade Organisation would benefit the country more than bilateral agreements.

“Toyota, Honda and Procter & Gamble are the three multinational corporations that have benefited the most from the Indo-Thai FTA,” said Sharif D. Rangnekar, an economic analyst and editor of the Indiabiznews.com website.

He added that “these three companies find the logistics of doing business with India rather attractive because they have major manufacturing units in Thailand and find it easy to launch their products in India”.

Indian products, on the other hand, “don’t have a large market in Thailand even if they have the required certification,” Mr Rangnekar said, explaining that this is partly due to the fact that India’s population of 1.1 billion dwarfs that of Thailand.

Criticism of the India-Thai FTA has come from a wide range of sources, including industry groups, independent research think-tanks and columnists. In 2004, the National Council of Applied Economic Research slammed the pact, primarily because of the complicated issue of “rules of origin”. It also questioned if the “early-harvest” agreement is compatible with WTO rules.

Last year, India’s Ministry of Commerce undertook an impact assessment study of the limited trade scheme with Thailand, which analysed trade flows and drew inferences for the future. The Tariff Commission also submitted a similar study to the federal Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion in New Delhi.

The CII committee headed by Mr Kanoria will soon come up with guidelines for the Indian government to consider before negotiating FTAs. These are expected to include guidelines relating to negative list, common floor prices and rules of origin.

A survey by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), one of the largest apex industry associations in India together with the CII, found in 2005 that imports from Thailand rose phenomenally under the limited FTA, while exports from India to Thailand actually declined.

It is that time of the year again when thousands of students across the country appear for a slew of entrance examinations conducted by various business schools in the country.

This year, the examinations begin on November 11 and end on January 6. Unfortunately, Symbiosis National Aptitude Test (SNAP) and ICFAI Business School Aptitude Test (IBSAT) are scheduled on the same day (December 16).

Speaking to The Hindu, Ajay Arora, Director, Triumphant Institute of Management Education, Bangalore centre, said that the clash in the dates of a few management aptitude tests is not uncommon. “I do not know what the fuss is all about. Every year, something similar happens,” he said.

Last year, the entrance exam for Faculty of Management Studies and Narsee Monjee Aptitude Test were held on the same day. “One cannot blame the institutions for the clash in dates. The best time to conduct the entrance tests is between November and January, as the students will not be over-burdened with mid-term examinations,” Mr. Arora said.

The admission cycle is such that for a programme to commence in June, the entrance test must be conducted between November and January, so that the results may be announced in April. Mr. Arora said that around 20,000 students of the country appear for the IBSAT and 18,000 to 20,000 appear for SNAP. “The question is how many of those students will appear for both the entrance tests. That group is not very big. The number of students ‘affected’ is minimal,” he said.

Bangalore: ICFAI Business School (IBS) began in 2008 authorization of two years MBA program, said the director of Bangalore IBS TR Venkatesh.

Sharing the calendar of events, on Friday said IBS Venkatesh, Bangalore, recognize, some 500 students, including participation in national competitions. IBSAT, the entrance test will take place in 200 centres, December 16.

According to the timetable, the deadline for filing the application is 20 November. Interview and approval of the decision, in the admission examinations will take place between February 4 and 18 years.
New Campus

IBS said Venkatesh building was a State-of-the-art campus in Mysore Road, priced at Rs 70 crore. He said IBS has already acquired the land and worked other formalities. The new campus is a youth hostel for students and districts of the Faculty. It would be ready by June 2009, he said.