Dr Bhimaraya Metri's Reappointment: Vision for IIM Nagpur
IIM Nagpur Director Dr Bhimaraya Metri has been reappointed for a second five-year term, giving the institute a stable leadership to execute a long-term institutional development plan. Dr Metri frames his vision for second term clearly. Speaking with MBAUniverse.com, Dr Metri said, “We want to elevate IIM Nagpur into the league of the first-generation IIMs and make it one of India's leading management institutions. Everything we are doing is aligned to this vision.”
Sharing his priorities for the new term, Dr Metri outlined his key focus areas. The first is to complete the ongoing infrastructure expansion worth Rs 250 crore at the main Nagpur campus, while consolidating academic programmes and scaling up executive education. The second is to build the new 70-acre IIM Nagpur Pune campus, on land granted by the Maharashtra Government on a Rs 1 lease valued at over Rs 180 crore. The third is to widen the institute's footprint further, with a transit campus in Goa for leadership development programmes, followed by a potential global expansion of IIM Nagpur that the Director expects to explore after about three years. Through all of this, the flagship IIM Nagpur MBA and the institute's fast-growing executive education portfolio remain the core of the plan, even as new campuses and programmes are built around them.
IIM Nagpur Strategic Roadmap 2026-31: Seven Pillars
The IIM Nagpur Strategic Roadmap 2026-31 is the formal plan that ties these ambitions together. It sets out a multi-campus, research-led and globally connected future for IIM Nagpur, built on seven clear pillars that Director Dr Metri shared with MBAUniverse.com.
| Pillar | What it means for IIM Nagpur |
|---|---|
| 1. Leading management institution | Enter the league of first-generation IIMs, backed by a Rs 250 crore main-campus expansion adding hostels, a mess hall, classrooms, 100 double-bed executive rooms, a 600-capacity hall, a library and a swimming pool. |
| 2. IIM Nagpur Pune campus | Build a full-fledged 70-acre campus at Moshi in phases, with a five-year Integrated BBA-MBA and a five-year BTech-MBA (with the IITs) as flagship programmes. |
| 3. Goa transit campus | Set up a transit campus for executive education with the support of the Government of Goa; the Director says initial discussions have been very positive. |
| 4. Internationalisation | Partner with 20 leading universities worldwide for cross-continent exposure, dual-degree pathways, student and faculty exchange, joint research including PhD, and overseas executive learning. |
| 5. International accreditation | Secure at least two international accreditations from among AACSB, EQUIS and AMBA. |
| 6. Energy & climate leadership | Position IIM Nagpur as India's hub for energy and climate leadership, aligned with Viksit Bharat 2047. |
| 7. Growth engine for Vidarbha | Drive regional transformation through entrepreneurship, skilling, applied research and start-up incubation across Vidarbha and Maharashtra. |
Two of these pillars are uncommon and deserve a closer look. On energy and climate, IIM Nagpur will build on its Executive MBA in Energy Management, offered with the National Power Training Institute (NPTI), deepen its partnership with ONGC, and host the Centre of Excellence for Heat Resilience and Sustainable Cooling (CoE-HRSC) of the Government of Maharashtra. On regional development, the institute's Foundation for Entrepreneurship Development (InFED) will run a hub-and-spoke model across all 11 districts of Vidarbha to build incubation and innovation ecosystems. As a knowledge partner to MITRA (Maharashtra Institution for Transformation), IIM Nagpur supports skill development and capacity building, while its Council for Logistics, Infrastructure and Project Management (CLIP) is working on crowd-management strategies for the Nashik Kumbh (2027) and Ujjain Kumbh (2028). The institute is also part of MARVEL, the Government of Maharashtra's AI research-and-development initiative for disruptive technologies.
IIM Nagpur Pune Campus Plan: A New Full-Fledged Campus
The centrepiece of the roadmap is the IIM Nagpur Pune campus. The institute will develop a state-of-the-art academic and residential campus on 70 acres of government-allotted land at Moshi, in the heart of one of India's biggest manufacturing and IT-technology hubs. Once this campus becomes operational, IIM Nagpur will be the only Indian Institute of Management in the country to run two large full-fledged campuses, a distinction that significantly expands its academic and research capacity.
The Director said that the Pune campus will be built phase-wise, much like the main campus, and will focus on emerging, industry-relevant disciplines such as manufacturing, Industry 4.0, artificial intelligence, digital technologies and IT management. In line with NEP 2020, IIM Nagpur will open its doors to undergraduate and postgraduate integrated programmes at Pune, while keeping the main Nagpur campus as a postgraduate management institute.
IIM Nagpur Director Dr Metri told MBAUniverse.com that the objectives for the Pune campus are threefold:
Launch of Integrated 5-Year Programmes: a five-year Integrated BTech-MBA in collaboration with premier IITs, a foundational Integrated BBA-MBA fast-track course, and other new-generation emerging courses as the campus flagship.
Executive Education: taken to the doorstep of industry to sharpen the skills of working executives and offer lifelong learning in Pune, India's premier manufacturing and technology destination.
Startup ecosystem: an InFED branch at Pune to serve western Maharashtra, build an entrepreneurial mindset among executives and promote a start-up culture.
The IIM Nagpur Director is clear that Pune's location is central to this strategy, since the city's manufacturing base and IT strength give the campus a natural pipeline of live industry projects, recruiters and executive learners.
IIM Nagpur Journey: From 2015 to 2026
IIM Nagpur began its journey in 2015 under the mentorship of IIM Ahmedabad, and its first batch of the Post Graduate Programme (PGP) in Management commenced in July 2015. In November 2021, the institute shifted to its permanent 132-acre campus at MIHAN, Nagpur, Maharashtra, located about 9 km from the Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Nagpur International Airport.
The institute today offers the flagship two-year IIM Nagpur MBA, an Executive MBA, a Blended MBA for working professionals and a Doctoral (PhD) programme, along with management development programmes and specialised offerings such as the Executive MBA in Energy Management. With the Strategic Roadmap 2026-31 now in motion, the institute is positioning itself for its most significant phase of expansion since inception.
Indeed, IIM Nagpur is entering a decisive period. Under Director Dr Bhimaraya Metri's second term, the Strategic Roadmap 2026-31 combines a Rs 250 crore expansion at the main campus, a full-fledged 70-acre IIM Nagpur Pune campus at Moshi, new-age BBA-MBA and BTech-MBA programmes, global university partnerships, and ambitions to be counted in the world's Top 100 B-schools. For MBA aspirants, this signals more programmes, more campuses and more international pathways at one of India's fastest-evolving new IIMs. For the latest updates on IIM Nagpur, CAT 2026 and admissions to the top MBA colleges in India, keep following MBAUniverse.com, India's No. 1 MBA Portal.
IIM Nagpur has set out one of its most ambitious growth plans yet, and the person driving it is Director Dr Bhimaraya Metri, who now begins a second five-year term at the helm. In an exclusive interaction with MBAUniverse.com, Dr Metri shared how IIM Nagpur intends to move from a new-generation IIM into the league of first-generation IIMs, and eventually into the world's Top 100 business schools. He shared details of IIM Nagpur Strategic Roadmap 2026-31, which is headlined by a full-fledged 70-acre IIM Nagpur Pune campus at Moshi, launch of new-age integrated programmes such as a BBA-MBA and a BTech-MBA with the IITs, potential launch of a new Goa campus, and a sharper focus on energy and climate action. Read this exclusive MBAUniverse.com article for insights into IIM Nagpur's institutional development plans.