A Directors’ meet on ‘Promoting Entrepreneurship - Challenges and Opportunities’ was organized by IILM Academy of Higher Learning on 28th October, 2014 at its Greater Noida Campus in association with UPTU, Lucknow. Ms. Shivani Arora Assistant Professor, Department of Electrical and Electronics, Dr. Sahab Singh, Assistant Professor, Department of Management Studies represented Dronacharya Group of Institutions, Greater Noida at the event along with Mr. Lokendra Kumar Yadav.

The major objective of this meet was to provide a platform to discuss several challenges and opportunities in entrepreneurship, guidance by the resource persons working in this segment & networking with existing and prospective entrepreneurs to explore opportunities inviting all key stakeholders. Prof. R.K. Khandal, Hon’ble Vice Chancellor of UPTU attended the meet as a Chief Guest.

Prof. Chaiti Ganguly, Director, IILM welcomed the dignitaries who assembled for knowledge sharing on entrepreneurial related aspects. She urged eminent speakers to discuss on how to overcome the innumerable unavoidable bottlenecks in entrepreneurship and requested the audience to put forward their recommendations on tackling this issue.

Dr. R.K. Khandal, Hon’ble Vice Chancellor, UPTU Lucknow in his motivational keynote address stated that it is our joint responsibility to help budding graduates become successful entrepreneurs and suggested all academicians for gearing the engineering graduates to face the challenges of tomorrow. Dr. Khandal assured the gathering that UPTU will start some entrepreneurial programs over design and technology in two more institutions of the region shortly.

Ms. Sarita Chauhan, Chief Consultant & Head (Research), NIESBUD delivered the invited expert talk and shared her experience about entrepreneurship and present scenario of it in Indian Economy by giving a presentation on “Landscape of Entrepreneurship in India” and recommended entrepreneurship education in all institutions very strongly to overcome the problem of employability.

Subsequent sessions focused on specific topics as under:

Technical Session 1: Entrepreneurship-Challenges and Opportunities: Stakeholder’s

Perspective

Mr. Avinash Mishra, An Entrepreneur & Alumni of IILM, shared the real journey of his entrepreneurial venture with the audience. Mr. Neeraj Sharma demystified some common misconceptions of entrepreneurship followed by Dr. Rihan Khan Suri, Head Placement Cell, Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi who shared the inspirational success story of Mr. Sunil Bharti Mittal and his journey to a position of an entrepreneurial billionaire.

Technical Session 2 :Entrepreneurial Eco-System - Present & Future

Prof. Mahesh Gandhi, Director, GRE Group of Institutions, Greater Noida stressed the role of an academician in any entrepreneurial startup and advised that conceiving ideas and converting them into the application is a must for success. Mr. Deepak Mavinkurve, Travel Consultant, highlighted that a rich and healthy participation of stakeholders is necessary to promote innovations and skilling the perspective entrepreneurs. Mr. Siddharth Sharma, Consultant, Success Monks Performance Consulting professed that a person who thinks of giving back to the society more than he gets from it is only one who can be a good entrepreneur of the time.

Session 3: Entrepreneurship-Road Ahead / Action Points for all stakeholders

Dr. Vinod Dumblekar, Faculty, in his address said that everyone who has spirits and ability to convert a new idea or invention into a result without fear of right or wrong can be a successful entrepreneurship. Mr. Shyamal Agrawal, an Automobile Businessman, shared ideas to overcome the bottlenecks of entrepreneurship and the importance of finance and confidence needed to become a successful entrepreneur.

The meet was concluded by Prof. Nair who summed up the session and presented vote of thanks.