Dear Alumni,
The Valedictory Function for the outgoing Class of 2007-08 was held on Friday, the 28th of January 2008.Mr. Dinesh Khanna, President, Federation of Hotel and Restaurant Associations of India, delivered the valedictory address.
As a part of the tradition of the Institute, the evening also felicitated the Class of 1983 for completing 25 years of service to the hospitality industry.
They in turn expressed their gratitude by felicitating teaching and support staff of their time. They also instituted an endowment fund to be used as award for Second Year Student from next year.
All India Rank Holders:
In keeping with the tradition, our students excelled in the All India National Council for Hotel Management examination in 2007 annual exams. Following students were All India rank holders.
Arnab Chakraborty First Position in M.Sc.
Manasi Bidikar First Position overall B.Sc. H&HA
Gayatri Yadav First Position in 2nd Year of B.Sc. H&HA
Sonali Kesarkar First Position in 1st year of B.Sc. H&HA
Aloysius Joseph Saldanha First Position in PGDAOM
Bhavesh Patel First Position in F&BS craft
Mansi Bidikar Second Position in 3rd Year of B.Sc. H&HA
Sonali Saxena Third Position overall B.Sc. H&HA
Bipul Kumar Singh Third Position in 2nd Year of B.Sc. H&HA
Mudita Singh Third Position in 1st Year of B.Sc. H&HA
Thus our students have bagged 10 out of 16 possible All India ranks.
New Courses:
During the academic year 2007-08 we started an International Chefs Diploma of 1 ½ year duration in collaboration with George Brown College, Toronto, Canada and another 15 months course Institutional Hospitality Management in collaboration with RKHS ( Radha Krishna Hospitality Services), Mumbai . First batch of our culinary program in partnership with NOTL, Canada graduated this year and students are well placed in jobs in Canada.
Student Placement:
We have had around 95% placements so far (few placements are in finalisation stage). The Highest salary for this year was Rs. 25000 p.m.+ perks and the average salary was Rs. 12000 p.m.+ perks. Recruiters included hotels, restaurants, BPOs, airlines, multiplexes etc. 30 organizations came for campus recruitment.
Infrastucture Development:
Infrastructure development during the year included augmentation of Reading Room facilities in both Boys and Girls hostel, renovation of an air-conditioned class cum seminar room with five computers having free internet facility for Post Graduate Diploma in Dietetics students. A new housekeeping outdoor lab was added. Facility of a state-of-art studio kitchen was added. An 18 bed air-conditioned girls’ hostel became operational. A.T.K. was renovated and its capacity increased. Student dining hall was renovated with enhanced capacity which now seats 260 covers at one sitting. A parking lot for two wheeler has been developed.
The Training Hotel
At the Applied Training Centre (our training hotel) we have renovated and upgraded a number of guest rooms. Our ATC client list now includes many academic institutions. These are IIM, Bangalore, IIM Lucknow, IIM Indore, IIM Kozhikode, IIM Kolkata, IIM, Shillong and MDI Gurgaon. Besides corporate clients include CII, IMRB, PWC, Nicholas Piramal, J&J, ESPN, Dr. Batra, Nestle,
Consultancy Projects:
The Institute undertook a consultancy project for setting up of highway dhabas for Hindustan Petroleum. We also assisted BARC, and RBI, SBI in their recruitment / promotion process for managerial level positions by interview panel nominations. Our PG Dietetics students did a project at the request of Taj group of hotels to do a study of their staff meals and make recommendations for improvements. Under the capacity building for service providers scheme of Ministry of Tourism, Government of India we conducted four courses and trained 40 persons during the year.
Training and Development:
Under the staff training and development our faculty Aileen Sequeira successfully earned the Certified Hospitality Educator certification of the Educational Institute of American Hotel & Lodging Association. Another faculty Vishwanath Iyer is in process of acquiring the same. I attended the International CHRIE conference of hospitality educators at Dallas.
Overseas Scholars:
We also got a Fulbright scholar this year from USA to do a research on Mumbai Street Food. Year before we had another USA Fulbright scholar doing research on Impact of Islamic culture & Craft on cuisine.
Financial Health:
On the financial front Institute has also done well. Institute is self sufficient and does not take any grant from Government of India. Four fresh endowments have been added this year. These will result into a new awards category. We would like to express our thanks to Mr. Timmy Ayre, our ex-HOD F&B Service (Aus $ 450) and the batches of 1991, 1982, 1983 & 1994 for their generous contributions of Rs. 3000 / 35000 / 25,000 / 2,00,000 respectively. Like previous years, this year HRA (W.I) has awarded an amount of Rs.50,000/- towards scholarships to 5 Rs. 25000 p.m. needy students of our Institute. We are grateful to donors and HRA (WI).
Workshops and Seminars:
This year in our institute American Institute of Bakery organized a workshop for local bakers on pizza making. CMP a Thailand based event management company organized HOTELEX seminar on emerging trends in hospitality.
In collaboration with Alliance Francais a French bakery work shop was organized. A work shop on Slow Food was organized.
Alumni Get togethers:
Alumni get-togethers were held for 1957, 1987 and 1994 batches. 1957 batch get together was a special one in which 18 super seniors re-visited institute after 50 years.
Food Festivals:
A Japanese food festival and a sushi making contest was organized in collaboration with Maido india. A Norwegian sea food festival was organized in collaboration with Royal Norwegian Embassy. Our students also broke the Guiness record of largest sushi mosaic this year.
Dubai and Jamnagar experience:
A batch of 100 students of the final year along with two faculty members Mr. Asit Mishra and Mr. Jason were in Dubai in November 2007 to assist at the Dubai Air Show at the invitation of Emirates Airlines. Their services were highly appreciated by the organizers. Our students assisted ITC Grand Maratha food production team in their catering for YPO event organized by Reliance at Jamnagar recently.
China-India Exchange Visit:
A delegation of 7 of our students accompanied by our faculty Shubhda Kotibhaskar made a 10 day visit to China at the invitation of Chinese government. In turn a Chinese delegation of 15 hospitality educators and students visited us and stayed at our training hotel.
Distinguished Visitors:
During the year Institute had a number of distinguished visitors. These included:
- Dr. Carlo Petrini President of Slow Food, Italy
- Dr. Vanadna Shiva of Navdanya NGO
- Mr. Prabhat Pani CEO Ginger Hotels
- Dr. Steven Ferry, Chairman, Institute of Modern Butlers Florida
- Chinese tourism officials & educator
- Mr. C.M. Gandhi, Chairman, CMP, Bangkok
- Mr. George Mathew, Norwegian Consulate
- Officials from Japanese, Canadian, British & Norwegian consulates & embassies
Our gratitude to..
We will miss some of our dear and near ones who superannuated during the year. These include Avril Sule, our Housekeeping senior faculty, Mani Pereira, A.O. and Rajan our store keeper. We wish them all the best.
Sincerely yours,
R.K.Saxena,
Principal
Dated 3rd April, 2008