Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Sloan School of Management is planning to welcome India’s new Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, potentially becoming the first among the top-ranked American business schools to do so.
“The process is under way to invite the prime minister this year or the first half of 2015. Ultimately, it will depend on the mutual convenience of the Prime Minister and the MIT president. So, a firm date is hard to forecast right now,” said S P Kothari, deputy dean at Sloan School of Management.
Organizers of last year’s India Economic Forum at Wharton expect the institution to issue an apology and perhaps extend another invite to Modi. The forum had last year invited Modi to deliver the keynote address via video conference, before cancelling the invitation in the face of protests over his alleged role in 2002 riots in Gujarat. The forum had also invited Aam Aadmi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal at the same time last year. The Adani Group had cancelled its sponsorship of the event following the controversy.
Wharton Business School’s India Economic Forum unceremoniously cancelled the then Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi’s keynote address last year. Akshay Bhushan, co-chair of last year’s Wharton India Economic Forum, said that the educational value in hearing about Modi’s development model for India as well as the support of the organizing team comprising 90 students had given him the confidence to extend the invite.
Bhushan said, adding that the former forum members believe that the university and Wharton administration should offer an apology as well as offer another invitation to Modi. “We hope they learn from this experience and not sacrifice free speech and basic manners and propriety. We are proud that as a student team, we invited future pioneers in India’s democracy well before the mainstream media accepted them,” said Bhushan.