"Arbit" Appreciation

To say that the last 2 weeks have been overwhelming, would be an understatement.. What started of with my trivial forward of Arbit Choudhury comic strips to my mailing list, has snowballed into manumental proportions.. after having received truckloads of appeciation mails (not just from various B-schools, but also from remote corners of the corporate world), i am finally beginning to realize that I might have created a phenomenon.. something which has the potential to become a global B-school icon..

Now the dielemma is, not if, but how to continue with it? Should we make a website for Arbit, or a yahoogroup, or make all fans wait till MastishK 2005.. One ingenious idea is to make it the world's 1st Open Source Cartoon Strip.. inviting ideas form all readers and incorporating the best ones...The decision will come soon.. for the time being, let me wallow in the sea of appeciation.. here are some of the best compliments we have received so far--

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just saw your complete collection ofarbit choudhury. it was really amazing.hats of to uguys for creating something so unique.keep doing thegood work.hope to see more from your guys in future

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liked the character sketch of Arbit Chaudhary very much. He is verymuch of what we do in B School Really remarkable.

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frm a huge plethora of forwards it was a welcome relief....

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Extremely nice creativity, especially ur SCM concept of sex, underworld of one way, andJIT. Being an engineer and experienced in JIT & SCM organization, Ireally like this cirque.

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keep going and give every1 a reason to smile.

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Creativity and application to achieve a great and memorable result.

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Well I myself is not froma B-School grad but then I have seen the B-School life from quite close.This sure is a good description of that. Well Dilbert talk about the lifefor an employee.. which is not the case with ARbit... I guess you should tryfocusing on the early days of Arbit in the college when he enter theB-School and gets the shock of his life to get a different picture of theB-Schools..

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the character ARBIT Choudhury is simply superb, apart from the fun part I think it carries some message for MBA criticizers, its your creativity guys. Hope ARBIT Choudhury will hover around for ever.

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I just wanted to congratulate you both on the innovative and creative ideaof creating a Cartoon Character with which all of us can associateourselves with.

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Life of Arbit C. and mine looks almost the same.

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Astounding, is the only word that comes to my mind when I think offeed back for your work on Mr. Arbit Choudhury. Amazing art work andalso witty strips, and moreover everything is related to Mangement, sothats really goog.

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hellofa job u guys have done..actually you know what makes me write this is many of Arbit'ssnippets i used to have with my friends this actually took me back to my discussions with them on chaiki tapri...as i still owe my MBA to govind(the chaiwala)..hahaha..

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Just saw a piece of "F" ART- a good art.

Infact was thinking that this is what we used to think while Doing MBA.

But only Work pays and not just ideas which die in our mind,

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Arbit is a nice icon for B schoolers I'm sure.I'm very certain all the B schoolers who have read the strip would havesaid to themselves, "Hey! That's me!". I could relate to him myself! Whydon't you form an Arbit fan club and ask readers for ideas.

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What surprises me is that you managed to find time and creativity despite your busy schedule to invent it! Having done an MBA and having an inclination for creativity, I understand and appreciate your work. Great work guys!Hope you'll carry on with the strip. Maybe you could make it a fortnightly treat for your colleagues. If you have a regular college magazine or newsletter, get it published. I'm sure people will admire and appreciate your efforts.

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I have forwarded arbit to all my groups...he seems to be a great hiteverywhere...Yesterday at home we had a gala time reading andlaughing...Really good time...

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Expand, innovate, franchise and partner to make this bigger!!!

Talk to ET, BW, BT, BI!!!

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simply amazing...u guys seem to have put in a lot of work !!!! bahut socha hai strip par.....guess u have started a great idea that other bschool events would find hard to match !

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Though I am not a Management Grad, I am a consultant and I use all these fundas everyday. “Yeh Dil Cahe Thoda Aour”

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They say most of the Surd jokes were coined by Surds themselves.. After all it takes a real sport to laugh at one's own tribe... U guys have hit the nail on the head... MBA is all bosh... Keep up the good work !!

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Thanks folks... Arbit will be back soon.. in a mailbox near you..

"Arbit Choudhury"

A collection of "Arbit Choudhury"- The 1st ever B-schol comic strip.

The Making of "Arbit"-

OBJECTIVE: To create the 1st ever B-school comic strip.

STEP 1: Create the character
a). Decide on who should the lead character represent. As the strip was meant for B-school junta, the lead character was picked as a B-school student.
b). Decide the name of the strip/character. After much deliberation, the character was christened “Arbit Choudhury”.
c). Design the character sketch. The likes, dislikes, aims, aspirations, habits, behavior, talents of the comic hero were defined. The final character sketch was as follows-

“Arpit Choudhury is a typical 2nd Year MBA student of a leading B-school. His life revolves around all the daily chores of a MBA education. Tests, assignments, presentations, competitions, case studies, net-surfing, chatting, ctrl+C, ctrl+V are as much part of his daily routine as food, drinks, friends and girl-friends are. Sleep is word not present in his Dictionary. As any other management grad., he dreams big, and farts bigger. He often finds himself juggling with the concepts of strategy, logistics, marketing, finance etc., and tries (in vain) to apply these in real life situations. He has come to believe- “Management is an Art… And Art is a 4 letter word, with a 'F' silent ” !’”....
His wisecracks frequently have everyone rolling in mirth. Perturbed by his penchant for blurting business balderdash, his friends jokingly call him “ARBIT Choudhury”......”

d). Design the appearance. Design of the wardrobe, the hirestyle, and looks was done.

STEP 2: Generate Ideas
a). Think of original ideas. Days were spent pondering over humor in common B-school situations, application of management funda in real life and so on.
b). Take ideas from the environments. Ideas were taken from friends and classmates.
c). Test ideas on Humor scale. Ideas were presented to a test audience, for their feedback.

STEP 3: Sketch
a). Visualize the setting. Common B-school environs were visualized.. canteen, library, class, stairs and so on.
b). Draw draft with pencil.
c). Refine Draft. The draft sketch was checked for proportions and aesthetics.
d). Finalize Draft. After all refinements, the draft was finalized by bordering with pen. At this stage, the strip looked something like this-


STEP4: Colour
a). Scan drawing.
b). Decide the colour combinations.
c). Fill colours using Photoshop. After this, the image looked somewhat like this-

d). Put title bar on top.
e). Fill in the dialogues. And finally, an edition of the 1st ever B-school comic strip gets created.

It's Showtime Folks!!!

MastishK- India's 1st Fully Online Management Games Extravaganza, has gone LIVE.. and for all members of Team MastishK, it’s crunch time.. Hardly any one of us has caught a proper nap since the 25th.. Everyone seems to be in hyper mode.. scampering here and there making arrangements, slogging it out managing the dynamically changing scenarios of games.. or simply burning the midnight oil answering queries of contestants.. Discussions, differences, disputes have become a part of our daily routines.. But as they say, the proof of the pudding lies in the eating.. and so far, the pudding tastes really good..

Nikhil, the IT whiz, incharge of managing all the technical nitty-gritties, shuttles from one team meeting to another, clearing technical snags, providing coding consultancy, and keeping the games on track.. Hemant, the creative mastermind, is constantly conjuring newer ideas for the look and feel of the site, fine tuning the gaming console and user interfaces as well as making sure that all schedules are met.. All game teams are busy crunching truckloads of data being fed in by participants across the land.. and getting the future phases of the games ready to go.. As for me, I am busy doing what I do best, and love most.. creating “Arbit Choudhury”-the 1st ever B-school Comic Character.. A new strip goes up daily.. After the ideas are ready.. about 4 man-hours go into the creation of each strip.. from sketching to scanning to coloring.. Hemant has been taking time off his hectic schedule to help me out with the creative and technical assistance..

Now for the junior team.. MastishK had been coceptualised long before the new batch arrived.. but they have been an intergral part of the development of MastishK.. so much so that it is impossible to imagine the launch of MastishK without their wholehearted participation.. more so as the event is completely conceptualised and developed inhouse.. not a single component being outsourced to anyone...

We have been overwhelmed by the success of the event so far.. With more than 10,000 hits and 2000 registrations.. not just from B-schools across Asia, but also from over 40 corporates.. and junta from more than 20 countries.. MastishK has far exceeded all our expectations.. and it’s not over yet.. Come 12th October.. when MastishK 2004 concludes.. all of us can finally take a deep breath and look back on the results of all the sweat and toil of the last 3 months.. and start the next endeavor.. whose implementation will be the responsibility of the next batch.. MastishK 2005.. bigger and better than ever before.....

The games have just begun....