A MULTI-LANE MANAGEMENT EXPRESSWAY

MANAGEMENT EDUCATION HAS MOVED TO BECOMING A CONTINUUM, AND INDIA STANDS AT THE EPICENTRE OF THIS TRANSFORMATION

- By Kaushik Deka

EVERY YEAR, WHEN THE INDIA TODAY BEST B-SCHOOL SURVEY ARRIVES, it performs a small but essential act of national introspection.

It asks: what does ambition look like in India today? Where does the country believe managerial talent should come from? And how far will the management-education establishment go to stay relevant in a world being reprogrammed by technology, geopolitics and shifting aspirations?

This year's survey, conducted by market research agency MDRA, is the story of an industry that once prided itself on stability but now faces volatility. It's a story of students who once measured success in salary packages but now read value in flexibility, networks and lifelong relevance.

Across campuses, something fundamental is shifting. Where the Indian MBA was once a monolith—two years of classroom learning, heavy case-based pedagogy and an unyielding hierarchy of institutions—it is now a multi-lane expressway offering divergent routes: full-time programmes for young graduates, online degrees for working professionals, advanced certificates for mid-career executives and doctoral pathways accessible even to senior industry specialists. Management education has moved to becoming a continuum, and India, with more than 4,000 B-schools and the world's youngest workforce, stands at the epicentre of this transformation.

A two-tier system consolidates