IIM Ahmedabad campus to have JSW School of Public Policy

Ahmedabad

JSW Steel inked an MoU with the Indian IIM-Ahmedabad here today to set up a School of Public Policy to provide an avenue for “intellectual debate”, a senior official said.

JSW Steel Ltd CMD Sajjan Jindal announced signing of the MoU and said that the JSW Group would contribute around Rs 50 crore to set up the school at the new IIM-A campus, which would be managed by current faculties of the institute.

“The idea to set up a public policy school was in my mind for a long time. In India, we don’t have many institutes where one can discuss public policy. Our economy is maturing and in four years, it will figure among the top four economies of the world. As the growth happens, there will be issues to address and that would require intellectual debate. This school will provide the avenue for such debate,” Jindal said.

Jindal also mentioned current discussions on the Land Acquisition Bill and said that land is a very important issue.

“Today, one of the hottest topic is land reform. Land acquisiton is the biggest issue at present. There is a lot of debates happening by politicians on the issue, but there is no intellectual debate taking place. No industry, cities or infrastructure can be devleoped without land,” he said.

When asked about the size of the upcoming school which is named as JSW school of Public Policy, Director of IIM-A Ashish Nanda said that will be planned soon.

“We have not yet decided about the detailing of the course. A panel of experts including IIMA faculties will come up with a plan about duration, content and other details about the course,” Nanda, director of IIMA here today told before reporters.

On the sidelines of the MoU signing ceremony, Jindal told reporters that Indian steel industry is passing through a very difficult time.

“There is a large over capacity in the world primarily driven by China, which contributes over 50 per cent of the global steel capacity,” Jindal said.

“With its (China’s) GDP slowing down to seven per cent, requirement of steel is dropping in China. Since its domestic market is not absorbing the steel produced there, it is forced to export to countries like India,” Jindal said.

Jindal said the countries like Japan and Korea, which used to export mainly to China have been forced to shift to export to countries like India where they sell hot rolled products at USD 350 per tonne as against USD 500 per tonne in their own domestic market.

“While India has an FTA (foreign trade agreement) with Japan and Korea, steel is landing in India at around USD 385, making the Indian steel industry uncompetitive. We are taking it up with the Government of India,” he said.

PTI