GREAT ACHIEVER SAMANT IS NOT ACCEPTABLE AS ‘MAHATMA'!

Biswaraj Patnaik

As millions across the world remembered Mahatma Gandhi and Lal Bhahadur Shastri with love and reverence on 2 October, many in India were surprised to know the addition of another ‘Mahatma' from Odisha. The Aditya Birla group for which the stinkingly wealthy BJD leader Santrupta Mishra worked for decades, has bestowed the coveted award on Achyut Samant, the founder of KiiT and KiSS organisations. Samant is famous for both being an ‘education entrepreneur' and a big social worker of a special kind. This good guy, once upon a time,  was a close associate of the late statesman-media biggie Pradyumna Bal who had set up a management institute in Bhubaneswar called Institute of Business Administration  and Training (IBAT) way back in 1990s when Samant was only a nondescript demonstrator or junior-grade lecturer at some private college in Bhubaneswar. As fate was destined to smile upon him, he came in close contact with Shri Bal looking for energetic, ambitious young men and women to run his organisation. Samant was so humble and obedient that Bal was morally compelled to make him his chief lieutenant. Bal died earlier than expected and the lieutenant took over without any resistance from any of the ‘Bal' family members.

Years have rolled by meanwhile. And now history books mention with pride that KIIT School of Management (KSOM) is an unparallaled academic outfit providing fantastic industry-focused management skills to potential corporate masters. Founded in 1993, the IBAT with a vision to make it a trend-setting centre for business education, where young people were exposed to a highly balanced mix of classroom learning and  hands-on skill picking sessions to turn them into successful professionals and great leaders.

Today, as part of the prestigious KIIT University, KSOM has spread across the whole country with a number of quality centres of learning. Not surprisingly, NAAC has rated KSOM highly to put it in the highest ‘A grade' category. The institutions strongly believe in making business education highly relevant by constant course updates, regular corporate interaction, real life exposure, faculty training and more importantly by instilling in all its stakeholders a deep sense of responsibility to the society at large. Achyut, by sheer hard work and of course some machinations here and there, has attained the proportions of a larger than life figure- so much so as to have  the actual founder Pradyumna Bal thrown out of the memory zone of the people of Odisha. The KiiMS medical college structure is perhaps the only object that bears the name of the dream empire's actual founder, which though  goes mostly unnoticed.

It is an undeniable fact that Achyut Samant has worked overtime, taken the extra mile and done everything humanly possible to develop the zero-level institution built by late Shri Bal to a colossal empire. His flagship institution Kalinga Institution of Social Sciences (KISS) is the envy of countless social scientists, social workers and activists who look upon the enviable organisation as an ‘out-of-the world' model where twentifive thousand students specifically from poor tribal communities of Odisha and elsewhere stay, board and study without having to spend a single penny. Thus, KiSS has made Samant a global hero. Incidentally, the highly rated monthly periodical ‘Reader’s Digest' chose to carry a story on Samant's extraordinary achievements as a social worker. Critics, as usual, pass unsavoury comments saying the ‘25k' number of students as suspect for no one to this day has ever taken a headcount of the resident students even once. They also say publicly that the organisation gets tons of money by way of grant which is only ‘free spending dough' for which only simple utilisation records are to be maintained for routine audit purposes. So, as most Indian NGOs are master jugglers of accounts with help from skilled auditors, accountants and tax lawyers, KISS too could be doing the same, as insiders keep spilling the beans publicly once in a while.

All the same, that Achyut Samant is a  hero, there is no doubt. The meteoric rise he has demonstrated to the world is highly commendable. Interestingly however, he says that he runs the gigantic organisation with the spill-over funds that get accumulated at the academic enterprises all of which are registered as nonprofit outfits duly endorsed by the Income Tax authorities under section 12 A.

Strangely, Achyut has been engaging in activities outside his core domain. He set up a news television unit  that keeps him bleeding like crazy. Similarly, he plunge into many other generally despised public spheres including power politics where he may have bled even more dangerously, have not been taken well by core sympathisers. The conscious members of public have not appreciated his political involvement one bit. His own insiders, probably disenchanted and disillusioned by him, have time to time leaked information about money having been misused- mainly that accrued from public contributions by way of students’ fees, unpaid taxes or grants from national and international donors. These public charges levelled against him are not without malice and vested interest. But then he could have done precious little otherwise as his private misadventures have engulfed incalculable amounts of money meant for nobler activities, particularly his run for Lok Sabha MP, and self-publicity ventures eversince he became a big name. He was very smart in choosing to be part of the most invincible BJD party headed by magician Naveen Patnaik believed to be the permanent victor all his life. Unfortunately, silly mistakes by a few party biggies destroyed the party, and Achyut too was washed away in the wild sea like a boat made of sheets of  paper. Very strangely, around this traumatic times, when most expected to be standing beside the genial boss, he abandoned the BJD as if it were an outfit of bandits and whores. He simply walked into the media crowd to scream he was giving up politics to pursue nobler things in life. That very single selfcentric act has causes his fall from public grace. Only because the BJP has come to power by surprise and the people are still in a state of confusion, did Achyut escape the wrath of the people. He declared the horrific decision rather too brazenly after tonsuring head like an utterly confused fellow pretending to have renounced life.

Achyut had the protection of the most powerful political leader Naveen Patnaik. Now he is a weaponless and highly vulnerable individual. The Majhi administration under the BJP command, is after Achyut already as there is great deal of public talk about his  ‘forest land grab' and other irregular as well as unlawful activities he has engaged across years to build the most enviable empire that the world gets to see today.

So, at a time when Achyut is not considered a saint publicly, some corporate entity declaring him a ‘Mahatma' hurts people more than it brings happiness. The souls of true saints like ‘Gandhi' and ‘Shastri' are likely to keep weeping in heaven through out the current festive season.

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