For IIMs & IITs of India, Flipkart is too poor for their students

There is a fight going on between the IIM Ahmadabad and Flipkart, a fight that IITs also seemingly joined on Thursday. The reason behind the behind the fight is the campus hiring that Flipkart carried out at the IIM-A earlier. The IIM-A graduates that Flipkart hired as trainees were supposed to join the e-retail firm from June. But Flipkart has delayed the joining date by six months. The IIM-A, which is arguably India's best management institute, is not happy about it.

"In the past few months, we've been working on restructuring our businesses to strike the right balance among key levers... As a part of this ongoing restructuring, the campus program will also go through a comprehensive overhaul," Flipkart explained in a blog post on its site. "As we work on redesigning this program, we have taken a decision to postpone the joining of new recruits by a few months. Instead of June 2016, the new recruits will now be part of the improved campus program in December 2016. Flipkart will also pay an additional joining bonus of Rs 1.5 lakh to all campus recruits."

Also Read: Full text: Flipkart explains why it is delaying joining date of new hires from IIM-A

Also Read: Full text: Flipkart delays joining date for IIM-A students, institute responds with angry letter

The chairperson at the IIM-A is obviously very angry about it all. "Let me assure you that not only students of IIM-A but all the other students from the different campuses are in shock to see such a mail from a well established name like Flipkart," The chairperson reportedly wrote back to Flipkart after the company notified students of the delay. "Future engagement of Flipkart with b-school campuses is bound to get affected as a relationship based on mistrust and lack of transparency can never be mutually beneficial."

It has been reported that Flipkart is going through some difficult time. There are questions around its valuations and people have started doubting if it can compete against Amazon. Some of the high-profile hires the company made, including Silicon Valley and Google veteran Punit Soni, have left the company.

It now seems that even as Flipkart struggles to steady the ship, it is no longer lucrative enough for the IIMs and IITs. On Thursday, the Economic Times reported that All-IITs Placement Committee is thinking of disallowing Flipkart from Day One slot for the campus hiring because the delay that has affected IIM-A students has also reportedly affected IIT students that Flipkart hired this year.

Another bone of big contention between the top institutes and Flipkart is compensation that the e-retail company is offering. Flipkart is saying that it will pay Rs 1.5 lakh to each student for the delay. But the IIM-A The chairperson says it is hardly any compensation. "The amount of 1.5 lakhs offered as joining bonus hardly qualifies as compensation for seven months of forced unemployment," writes the chairperson.

Although Flipkart seems to be slightly down, at least in terms of perception about its health, the ongoing saga shows that it is now probably too poor for the students of the top Indian institutes. And that is just sad to see. The company is still the top e-retail firm in India and is definitely still the biggest e-commerce start-up in India. It competes in an extremely tough environment where positions change quickly and drastically. And while it is easy to understand that IIMs and IITs are trying to protect their students, the whole fight is missing some context.

Even after years, Flipkart is a still a young company, and in many ways, still a start-up. This is not the kind of company that offers job surety or security. Instead, it offers challenges and a tantalising promise that if the company makes it big, the employees will too benefit greatly. The IITs and IIMS need to keep this context in the background as they compare the firm to bigger and the more established companies like Google and Microsoft.

At the end of the day, how IIMs and IITs plan their campus hiring is their prerogative. But the way they are acting right now seems elitist and gives out the impression that Flipkart is now probably too poor for them and their students.