Yay! My alma mater does it again!

IIM Indore is going to make a case-study out of Krrish on “successful promotion of Brand India”. Well whatever that means! In fact initially I had thought they were going to make a case-study on brand placements within Krrish — something that would have been of relevance to students of media, marketing and branding — perhaps looking at ways of measuring ROI from in-film brand placements.

“IIMs are in consensus for short-listing ‘Krrish’ as one of the first Indian movies which has a capability of an international-level case study. It is one of the few movies which has emerged from Third World countries to have a say in the world market,” said Prashant Salwan, professor of international business and marketing, IIM-Indore.

In the past also, IIM Indore had decided to ride the hype bandwagon when it had decided to use the film Lagaan as a teaching aid in its module on leadership. Well, I have nothing against using a film for putting across concepts, it’s the press release announcing this to the world that makes me feel a little ‘IIPM ish’, if you know what I mean.

In our time we had a case-study on the Uruguay football team survivors from an air crash in the Andes ranges. It talked of how, faced with survival issues, the team dynamics evolved — with various team members taking on different roles as they struggled for survival — leader, follower, supporter, fence-sitter etc. Some years later I saw the film Alive on the same crash, and I appreciated the concepts even more.

In the above quote I was most-intrigued by the “consensus on short-listing Krrish” part. My mind couldn’t help but imagine the directors of the 6 IIMs sitting in a screeing room deciding which film should be used as a case-study!

Hope Arjun Singh doesn’t get a whiff of this, lest…