A group of leading industrialists and professionals came together on Monday to give thought leaders from various fields a platform to debate, discuss and generate ideas. The forum — the Chennai International Centre (CIC) — hopes to boost the city’s image as the “intellectual capital of India.”
Gopal Srinivasan, chairman and managing director, TVS Capital, who will spearhead this initiative as chairman of CIC, said, “This is a place to stimulate thinking in Chennai about Chennai. The centre will serve as a hub to exchange information and ideas in various disciplines including history, literature, culture, political science and business. This will be done through discussion, seminars and lectures,” he said.
The CIC will also engage with the next generation by holding interactions with school, colleges and education institutions.
Mr. Srinivasan said that the CIC has been structured as a company, but a trust will also be set up.
The CIC Trust is the sponsor and promoter of CIC which is a Section 8 company.
It has 10 board members, 12 trustees and 16 patrons.
M. S. Srinivasan, former Petroleum Secretary, also a trustee and board member of CIC, said, “The trust has promoted this centre as a not-for-profit company.”
He called the CIC an idea whose time has come.
Infosys co-founder and former chairman of Unique Identification Authority of India, Nandan Nilekani will be the first guest to deliver a speech at the CIC on July 29. The event will be held at the Madras School of Economics. The CIC intends to build its own premises in the near future.
The centre is the fifth of its kind in India.
“The first centre — India International Centre – was set up in 1959 at New Delhi,” said V. Ravichandar, another trustee and board member of CIC and chairman of Feedback Business Consulting Services Private Limited. The International Centre Goa came up in 1996 and the Bangalore International Centre started in 2005. “Pune was the most recent one,” Mr Ravichandar added.
N. Lakshmi Narayanan, trustee and board member of Chennai International Centre and vice-chairman of Cognizant Technology Solutions, said, “The future belongs to ideas, the more disruptive the idea, the more growth it delivers. This forum will be a platform where one can debate, generate and discuss ideas for a better future,” he said.
Noting that one of the areas of focus of the Tamil Nadu Vision 2023 is science and technology, Mr Narayanan said, “Some of these objectives (of TN Vision 2023) can be met through our platform.”
Around 100 people have signed up as members with the CIC.
