This is the combined issue (December 2021 and March 2022) of Connexion. Since I wrote to you last, we celebrated our Diamond Jubilee Foundation Day on 14th November 2021. This Day also saw the giving away of the Distinguished Alumnus Award to four of our eminent alumni: Shri Sunil Kumar Alagh, Founder and Chairman of SKA Advisors (PGP 3rd batch), Dr. Vallabh Sambamurthy, Albert O. Nicholas Dean, Wisconsin School of Business (18th PGP batch), Srinath N - Chief Executive Officer, Tata Trusts (PGP 21st batch) and Dr. Krishnamurthy Subramanian - Chief Economic Advisor, Ministry of Finance, Government of India (PGP 34th batch). Professor Dipesh Chakrabarty, one of our distinguished alumni and a globally renowned historian, delivered the Diamond Jubilee Lecture. Also, during this period, we had Professor Debashis Saha joining as the "Class of 1992 - 27 Forever Chair Professorship". I once again thank our alumni of the PGP 27th Batch for having instituted this Chair through their generous contributions. Also, so far the PGP 28th batch has successfully raised approximately 3.5 crores as contributions to the Institute. We had occasion to acknowledge the initiative and efforts of the 22nd PGP batch towards the upgradation of sports facilities. The Institute installed a plaque as a token of a gratitude to commemorate their collective endeavour.
You may have received our calls for nominations for the Distinguished Alumnus Awards of the Institute for the year 2022. I urge you to participate in the process so that we get a larger set of nominations. I am pleased to share with you the good news that Professor Runa Sarkar received the IIMC Alumni Association, Calcutta Chapter’s Magnus Award at a function at Bengal Club on 14 March 2022. This was a joyous occasion for most of us as we spent a wonderful evening with our alumni on that occasion. We look forward to having closer interactions with city chapters of our Alumni Association in near future as the scare of the pandemic ceases to adversely affect our everyday activities. To compensate for the disruptions caused by the pandemic, we are having a series of alumni reunions spread over next few months besides the usual silver jubilee event –Reminiscences – that we hold every December.
Please do visit us in the campus next time you are in the city. I will be too pleased to partake of your memories of campus life over a cup of coffee in the lush green surroundings that we have assiduously managed to preserve till now.
Prof. Manish Thakur
Dean (New Initiative and External Relations)
IIM Calcutta marked its 60th-year celebrations by hosting the Diamond Jubilee Lecture online and the Distinguished Alumnus Award ceremony at the campus on November 14. The event began with a welcome address by Director IIM Calcutta, Professor Uttam Kumar Sarkar. Professor Manish Thakur, Dean (New Initiatives & External Relations), shared glimpses of how the Distinguished Alumnus Award was initiated. The Award, which is in its twelfth year, was instituted during the Golden Jubilee celebrations in 2011 to recognize and felicitate eminent institute alumni. Prof. Thakur congratulated all the recipients of the Award for their exceptional achievements. He also added that their remarkable contributions in their chosen fields are a matter of great pride for their alma mater.
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The names and with current organisation and designation of the four alumni of the Institute who were bestowed with Distinguished Alumnus Awards in 2021 for their exemplary contributions in their respective fields are:
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Indian Institute of Management Calcutta signed a ‘Statement of Intent’ (SOI) with Capacity Building Commission, Government of India, for knowledge partnership on February 17, 2022. The SOI was signed by Prof Uttam Kumar Sarkar, Director of IIM Calcutta, and Shri Hemang Jani, Secretary, Capacity Building Commission. The Capacity Building Commission (CBC), constituted in April 2021, has the mandate to enhance the execution capacity of the Indian states by radically improving the government’s human resource management practices and augmenting the capacity of India’s 25 million civil servants. As part of this initiative, the Commission entered into a knowledge partnership with the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta to structure a comprehensive strategy of innovative management development training for civil services at multiple levels.
Read More >Alumni Cell of IIM Calcutta interacted with the Distinguished Alumnus Award 2021 recipients during their visit to IIM Calcutta. We present here these interviews:
Alumni Cell: Can you tell us a bit about your early childhood, about where you grew up and what was your childhood like?
Sunil Alagh: I was born and brought up in Calcutta, and lived there till the age of 21. Now I am staying in Mumbai. I have some very good friends in Calcutta. I have learnt Bengali, though I am a Punjabi. My parents were from Chakwal, now in Pakistan. They came over to Calcutta during the exodus of Independence. As a result, I had my education in Calcutta (St. Joseph’s, St. Xavier’s and IIMC). My father was in the motor parts business, and if I went into that, then perhaps we would have gone into manufacturing. But I didn’t think that I was cut out for family business and decided to go work for large companies. I grew up in a 1000 sq. ft. flat in Calcutta. I had a friend, Aveek Sarkar, who had a bungalow and came to college in a car. My other friend, Shyamal Dutta, stayed in a 300 sq. ft. flat. But none of it made any difference to any of us. We are still the best of friends, and all achieved our dreams in one way or the other. What it taught me was that money and position don’t last, but relationships do.
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Alumni Cell: How was your journey as a Business School student to a dean at a reputed business school?
Vallabh Sambamurthy: Actually, it was a great journey, but I'll start by saying that when I graduated from IIM Calcutta, I didn't plan on becoming a professor, let alone being a dean. I loved my job in marketing, it was really great, but after a couple of years, a chance meeting with a fellow classmate who was going to the US, made me think about other options and that's how I became intrigued. And then I realized that, I probably didn't see myself working in the industry for a long time. However, sometimes, the other side looks greener, so I thought more about it. When I was a student here, I was also a teaching assistant for the accounting course and that had been good. So, I wanted to feel the thrill of teaching and that's why I went there. I discovered that professors don't just teach, they actually do research. The job is much more multidimensional, richer. So that made me think that I made a good choice. The next goal was to be the best professor. So excellent teaching, excellent research, and creating a lot of new courses. And so, for 20 years, I was mostly focused on being a professor
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Alumni Cell: Can you tell us a bit about your early childhood, about where you grew up, and what was your childhood like?
Srinath Narasimhan: My parents got transferred very often and I got to live in different cities. It became very difficult to develop steady friends because we kept moving every two years or three years. I had to repeat some classes because of midyear shifts and lost a couple of years which I was fortunate to be able to make up in later years. I did get to live in different cities, go to different schools and see very different environments - so it was quite interesting.
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IIM Calcutta organised a felicitation ceremony on campus to convey their gratitude to the entire class of PGP 22nd batch for their thoughtful generosity towards their alma mater. This contribution of Rs 55 lakhs will be utilized to reform the infrastructure and modernise the student’s sports complex. The ceremony was inaugurated by unveiling of the ‘Foundation stone’ recognizing the contribution of the PGP 22nd batch towards the upgradation of the multi utilitarian sports courts. Present at the ceremony were Professor Uttam Kumar Sarkar, Director, IIM Calcutta along with Professor Manish Thakur, Dean (New Initiatives & External Relations) and Professor Bhaskar Chakrabarti. The event was attended by faculty members, officers and staff and students.
Read More >IIM Calcutta has engaged with an Alumni Portal provider to keep connected with its alumni, since a portal is a means to connect. The URL to register or connect is https://alumniportal.iimcal.ac.in/. This portal will help us in re-igniting the bond between the Alumni and the Institute. More importantly, this will give the Alumni to connect to each other in a more seamless and organized way. Mind you, this is not the Institute’s portal. This is a dedicated Alumni Portal for its alumni, where Alumni come and engage with each other mostly, and sometimes with the Institute. More updates will be there in the next issue of Connexion.
IIM Calcutta witnessed 100% Placements for its 57th Batch. The entire process was conducted virtually. 465 students took part in the finals placement process, receiving 631 offers. The institute followed a cluster-based system where the participating firms were mapped to cohorts that were further mapped to their respective cluster. The process was conducted to prioritize student-recruiter fit as students were given an option to hold & wait after getting an offer and to apply dreams across clusters. 190+ firms participated in the Finals Placement process, and the median salary for the process was INR 31 Lakh, while the average salary stood at a record INR 34.2 Lakh. The consulting sector once again emerged as the top recruiter, with 49% of offers being raised in the domain. Accenture Strategy, Bain & Company, Boston Consulting Group, EY Parthenon, and McKinsey & Company were some of the top recruiters in this domain. Marquee Asset Management, Investment Banking, and Private Equity-Venture Capital firms made 18% offers once again, proving the mettle of the institution in the finance domain. Goldman Sachs and Avendus made the highest offers within this cohort. In the General Management and Marketing domain, 14% of offers were raised. Some of the prominent recruiters in the sector were Hindustan Unilever Limited, ITC, Nestle, Procter & Gamble, Tata Administrative Services, amongst others. 19% of overall offers were rolled out in the Product Management and Operations domains. Top recruiters included Amazon, Flipkart, Microsoft, Paytm, amongst others. Despite the uncertainty caused by omicron, there were several new recruiters on campus, including IIFL, Nykaa, Premji Invest, Rothschild, Zomato, and international offers from Emaar, Protiviti, etc.
Read More >Right on the heels of the recent BT-MDRA B-School Ranking 2021, where it was ranked 1st in Placements, IIM Calcutta completed its summer internship placement week for 58th batch on 30th October by securing a record breaking 570 offers for 476 students, with 142 firms participating.
This Placement drive was completely virtual and saw the expansion of Hold Wait (50 extra offers), Dreams (36 extra offers) policies which allowed all students to hold multiple offers and enabled companies to find a better Company-Student fit.
Bucking the perennial trend, Finance sector saw hiring in higher numbers (121 students), narrowly pipping the Consulting sector (120 students) for the spot of top recruiting sector; these two sectors together accounting for 50% of total hires.
The campus welcomed the participation from top financial institutions including Bank of America, Blackstone, Macquarie and top consulting firms like Accenture Strategy, Bain & Co., Boston Consulting Group, McKinsey & Co. Sales & Marketing and General Management accounted for 19% and 13% of total hires respectively with companies like Aditya Birla Group, Hindustan Unilever Limited, ITC, Mahindra, Mondelez, Nestle, Procter & Gamble, Star Disney, Tata Administrative Services being amongst the top recruiter in this sector.
Major software services and E-commerce brands continued their strong showing accounting for nearly 10% of hires. Top recruiters included Adobe, Amazon, Flipkart, Google and Microsoft. The students continued to show interest in new age startups like Byju’s, Navi Technologies, OLX, Swiggy and Unacademy.
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The Alumni cell welcomed Dr. Athreya, Yashaswini Samat, Soundari Mukherjea, Sharmila Pande, Rotna Das, and Shalini Gopalkrishnan. These incredible women shared stories of their time at Joka. They spoke of the acceptance that the most conservative to the most bohemian person received. Soundari Mukherjea spoke about her job using business storytelling to drive outcomes.
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The Crystal Jubilee Celebration of the PGPEX VLM program was held on 06th March 2022. This auspicious occasion was graced by the eminent guests from the industry- Mr. Peyush Bansal (CEO – Lenskart), Dr. Amitabh Saran (CEO – Altigreen Propulsion Labs), and Mr. Jyoti Kumar Agarwal (CFO – IndiGrid). The event was inaugurated by the Director of IIM Calcutta, Professor Uttam Kumar Sarkar, Professor Sumanta Basu (Chairperson PGPEX-VLM program), Professor Manish Thakur (Dean– NI & ER), Professor Bhaskar Chakrabarti (Dean-Academics), Professors Deepu Philip & BV Phani (Coordinator IIT Kanpur), Professors Arshinder Kaur & Lata Dyaram (Coordinator IIT Madras), Mr. G Sunderraman from CII, founding members of VLM program Dr. Sarita Nagpal, other professors, existing members of the VLM committee across three institutes and all alumni of the VLM program. The event started with a short recapitulation of the VLM journey.
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A team of 4 MBAEx students participated in competitions, Niramaya and Panacea, hosted by IIM Ahmedabad Red Brick Society and emerged National winners from among more than 750 participating teams from top tier B schools. An MBAEx student also participated in Saudagar: a business plan competition organized by Saksham- the entrepreneurship cell of IIM Udaipur and was declared a National Finalist. A student took part in "Education", arranged by Mulund College of Commerce (Mumbai) and was elected as member of board of studies for UG and PG Courses. IIM Bangalore conducted a startup Finance and Valuation case competition called NextUp in Eximius 2021, in which the participating MBAEx team made it to the top 5 National Finalists among some of the brightest finance minds from top B-Schools of India. Not far behind in sports, an MBAEx student won the gold medal for Armageddon Run (Arma Run), hosted by IIM Calcutta. The students also participated in events "Markovista, a marketing case competition organized by IIT Kanpur, "Sustain"- a national case based competition conducted by IIM Ahmedabad’s Sustainability Club, "Viksit" and "Mahayodha" – case competitions hosted by SJMSOM IIT Bombay.
Ravi Shankar Burnwal, Sahil Arora, and Roushan Kumar Singh of PGPEX VLM have won consecutive case study competitions. On 10th October 2021, VLMPians from the 15th batch became runner-up in a case study competition organized by IIT Kanpur. The case competition was part of Prabandhan'21 – the flagship management conclave of IIT Kanpur, and the challenge was to develop an expansion plan for a retail company (VegKart). The entire model was presented in a Business Canvas using secondary research and strategies to attract, convert, retain, and delight customers. The team also proposed various expansion strategies, including designing a robust supply chain through an Omni channel retail system to enter the tier-2 cities and emphasize regional/private label brands to increase profit margins.
Read More >The current MBAEX students are working on projects sourced by MBAEx alums and themselves in organizations like PWC, Indigo Airlines, Zensar, Persistent, Apollo 24x7, Lynk Logistics, Sasken, Equalize Health, Wozart etc. on software engineering process control framework, Go-To-Market Strategy for US and Indian markets, Designing Product Strategy, Business Strategy for Customer Engagement.
Coal India Limited has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta recently to train its senior executives in a week-long residential program on 'Contract Management’. Shri. S. K. Singh, GM- HRD, Coal India Limited signed the MoU on behalf of CIL and Prof. Manish Thakur, Dean (New Initiatives & External Relations), IIM Calcutta on behalf of IIM Calcutta. Shri. Vinay Ranjan, Director - P&IR, CIL, and Prof. Uttam Kumar Sarkar, Director, IIM Calcutta were present on the occasion.
Paschim Banga Samagra Shiksha Mission (PBSSM), Government of West Bengal and IIM Calcutta join hands in imparting leadership training for 1300 Head of Schools of government and aided schools in several batches. An initiative of the School Education Department, the ‘Leadership Development Programme’ is a proactive step taken by the West Bengal Government towards focused intervention in 1300 schools in West Bengal for a better outcome. The Hon'ble Education Minister of West Bengal, Shri Bratya Basu addressed the session. Inaugurating the first Batch of the programme, Prof. Uttam Kumar Sarkar, Director of IIM Calcutta, noted that "I am glad that the Paschim Banga Samagra Shiksha Mission (PBSSM), under the School Education Department, Government of West Bengal has identified and taken the lead in focussed intervention in primary education.
Read More >IIM Calcutta in cooperation with its Flagship Journal Decision (springer Nature), virtually organised the first Conference on "Dealing with Online and Blended Education in Modern Challenging Times" on March 5, 2022. The sudden outbreak of COVID-19 has challenged the education system across the world and forced the educators to shift to an online mode of teaching. The one-day conference offered a global platform to discuss the challenges and impacts of online teaching-learning along with the consequences of using hybrid education systems in a pandemic-affected world. The conference focused on themes related to education technology, role of multiple education sector stakeholders, and educational outcomes across all levels of education (pre-schooling, primary and secondary schooling, vocational and technical education, and tertiary education) so as to engage in debates around education for practitioner scholars. The webinar also included a panel discussion on educational challenges faced in a pandemic-ridden world, role of Online and Blended Education, and essential policies/programs used to curb them.
On Friday, October 8, 2021, the Financial Research and Trading Laboratory, IIM Calcutta, and the Stern School of Business, New York University, hosted the India Research Conference over zoom. Prof Kose John of NYU Stern and Prof Sudhir Jaiswall of IIM Calcutta were the key organizers. At the virtual meeting, leading academic and policy experts held an in-depth discussion on Indian financial markets and their implications for international economics. The event had two sessions for academic paper presentation and discussion and another session for the keynote speech.
Prof. Kose John, NYU Stern School of Business, started the conference with a welcome note and introductory remarks. Next, we had the presentation and discussion of four research studies. Among the scholarly papers presented at this conference, two papers had at least one author from an Indian business school: one paper was by a faculty member from ISB Hyderabad, while another was by faculty members from ISB Hyderabad and IIM Indore.
The keynote address was by Dr. Raghuram Rajan, Katherine Dusak Miller Distinguished Service Professor of Finance at Booth School of Business, the University of Chicago, and Former Governor of the Reserve Bank of India. Prof Viral Acharya of NYU Stern introduced Dr. Rajan. In his keynote address titled "The Relationship Dilemma: Why Do Banks Differ in the Pace at Which They Adopt New Technology?" Dr. Rajan shared that an important factor explaining the difference in the adoption of credit scoring technology among banks is the stickiness of past bank structures and associated managerial practices, which can hold back better procedures. The conference ended with a concluding remark by Prof. Sudhir S. Jaiswall, IIM Calcutta.
Tata Group in collaboration with Indian Institute of Management Calcutta, announced the 10th edition of Tata Social Enterprise Challenge 2021-22 in November 2021. This initiative is aimed to encourage the youth to step up to be the next generation of social entrepreneurs, raising awareness about Social Entrepreneurship and find India’s most promising early-stage social innovators. 500+ online applications already received so far.
IIMCIP along with the National Rural Livelihood Mission (NRLM) and State Rural Livelihood Missions (SRLM) of Bihar, West Bengal and Assam will be implementing World Bank aided initiative to offer incubation support to 150 women-led rural enterprises in each of these 3 states.
IIMCIP is one of the preferred incubator partners of Invest India to implement the Start-up India Seed Fund Scheme (SISFS). This scheme is intended to provide financial assistance to start-ups for proof of concept, prototype development, product trials, market entry, and commercialization. We have received 200+ applications and already selected 7 start-ups for incubation and funding.
IIMCIP incubatee Da"Spatio Rhobotique Laboratory has been selected among the Top 3 teams in BHUMI-BSF Grand Challenge, organised by Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY), in partnership with the Border Security Force (BSF). The startup was awarded Rs. 10 lakhs during the "Azadi ka Amrit Mahtosav" organised by Government of India, in the gracious presence of the Hon'ble Minister of Electronics and IT, Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw.
DSRL is working on ‘detecting tunnel or underground activities,’ to develop a ground penetrating radar system that can scan underground activities and tunnels, and can, additionally, be used for inspection of construction works, ageing dams, archaeological works, etc.
IIM Calcutta Alumni Association Kolkata Chapter honoured Dr. Runa Sarkar, a Professor with the Economics Group at IIM Calcutta, and the Convenor of the Centre for Development and Environment Policy, with the prestigious Magnus Award 2021 for her outstanding contributions in the field of academia. Professor Sarkar is an alumna (Fellowship/Doctoral Programme) of IIMC. She is a member of the jury for the Steelie Awards in sustainability instituted by World Steel Association and has authored and edited several books in the area of Business, Environment and Institutions.The event was attended by Professor Uttam K Sarkar, Director, IIM Calcutta, Professor Manish Thakur and Professor Bhaskar Chakrabarti, Dean (NI&ER) and Dean (Academic) along with other faculty members. It took place at the Bengal Club on 14 March 2022.
Heartiest congratulations to Vijay Lancy from the 41st batch of IIM Calcutta (2004 - 2006) for becoming the World Champion in Men's Doubles 45+ and securing his 2nd consecutive Gold medal at the prestigious Badminton World Senior Badminton Championships. Vijay Lancy was the winner in the Men's Doubles 40+ category in World Championships at Katowice, Poland with Ajith Haridoss and has now won the Men's Doubles 45+ in the World Championships at Huelva, Spain with Aneesh K. He is a 5-time National Champion and currently is designated as President, Coaching at Fitso where he heads all the Sports verticals. Incidentally, Vijay Lancy was felicitated by the IIMCAA Bangalore Chapter for his outstanding achievements in the field of sports in the year 2019.
Procter & Gamble (P&G) recently announced the elevation of Sundar Raman to the role of global CEO, fabric and home care division. The division that will be led by Raman includes renowned brands such as Ariel, Tide, Ambipur and Downy and contributes to about one-third of total company sales and net earnings. In his new role, he will be responsible for delivering top- and bottom-line growth through innovation (R&D), a synchronized E2E supply chain, brand-building and sales. He will succeed Shailesh Jejurikar who has been elevated as chief operating officer of the company.
Shalini Poddar has joined Disney+Hotstar as executive vice president- head of ad sales. She will be responsible for country ad sales revenue and strategy for Disney+ Hotstar and will also lead a talented team across all aspects of the ads business from business planning, sales, sales strategy including pricing and formats, revenue management, operations, data partnerships, programmatic, brand lab, measurement or return on investment (ROI) and customer marketing.
Indian School Finance Company (ISFC), a leading non-banking finance company, has on boarded IIM Calcutta alumnus Vipul Patel as its Chief Financial Officer. A veteran in the finance industry, he is a notable addition to the organization with his financial planning and business strategy expertise.
Hyderabad-based start-up Recordent, a credit and payment reporting fintech platform in the non-banking sector run by IIMC alumnus Winny Patro, formed a strategic partnership with the Food Service Distributors Association (FSDA) to bring access to comprehensive credit & data reports to the FSDA members through its SaaS-based platform.
HarperCollins India announced recently the publication of Young Blood: Ten Terrifying College Tales by Chandrima Das, an aluma of IIM Calcutta. After a decade-long career in management consulting, she followed her passion for writing.
Women’s branded apparel company and the owners of W, Aurelia and Wishful, TCNS Clothing has appointed IIM Calcutta alumnus Puneet Sewra as Chief Marketing Officer.
WebEngage, a leading full-stack marketing automation and customer data platform that helps businesses scale through intelligent engagement and retention, has announced recently the appointment of IIM Calcutta alumnus Ankur Gattani as VP, Growth and Marketing.
CDC, the UK’s development finance institution that will soon be renamed British International Investment (BII), has elevated Abhinav Sinha, the current Director and Head of Technology and Telecoms, Equity, to become the Managing Director and Head of Technology and Telecoms.
Delhi-based legal ed-tech company LawSikho has appointed Vibhas Sen as the director of marketing. Sen was a consulting chief marketing officer for various global organisations, start-ups and nonprofits across home decor, healthcare, fast-moving consumer goods and auto sector.
Barbecue buffet restaurant chain, Absolute Barbecues has roped in Reetesh Gade as its chief marketing officer. The chain operates in India and Dubai. Gade has moved on from the position of head of marketing at Nature’s Basket.
Mercer|Mettl, the global leader in talent acquisition and management, has appointed Amit Pal Singh as CTO to lead its technology and engineering functions. Amit will drive organisation’s technological vision to support Mercer|Mettl’s growth journey in the coming years.
| Name of the Programme | Programme Director(s) | Duration |
|---|---|---|
| BUSINESS ANALYTICS | ||
| Business Analytics using Strategic and Tactical Level Decision Making | Prof. Saibal Chattopadhyay & Prof. Uttam K. Sarkar | December 12 - 16, 2022 |
| BUSINESS COMMUNICATION | ||
| Analytical Communication and Data Presentation | Prof. Pragyan Rath & Prof. Nandita Roy | September 19 - 23, 2022 |
| Strategic Storytelling for Executives | Prof. Pragyan Rath & Prof. Nandita Roy | January 09 - 13, 2023 |
| BUSINESS TECHNOLOGY | ||
| FinTech, Blockchain and Cryptocurrency | Prof. Debashis Saha | November 09 - 12, 2022 |
| Industry 4.0 and Internet of Things (IoT) - What every manager needs to know about them | Prof. Debashis Saha | February 13 - 16, 2023 |
| Digital Technology Management for Business Excellence | Prof. Debashis Saha | March 02 - 05, 2023 |