Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi alumni Vikram Gupta has composed and sung a song for a music video to call for donations for the Alumni Endowment Fund that the institute has been planning for over a year now. The video, published by Vikram on his YouTube channel, promotes the launch of IIT Delhi's Endowment Fund that aims to raise USD 1 billion by 2025 — and it is not impossible from the stats the video is loaded with.
IIT Delhi had announced last year that it was planning to establish an alumni endowment fund that will assist in the institute’s functioning. IIT had earlier asked its alumni to pledge a part of their assets to the institute, particularly those of the golden jubilee and silver jubilee celebration batches.
The video celebrates the successful IITians who graduated from the Delhi campus — from start-up stars like Flipkart's Binny Bansal and Policy Bazar's Yashish Dahiya, author Chetan Bhagat, IAS officers and environmental activists and workers also feature in the video and are introduced with their profession, batch and hostel. It will surely bring back memories of the good old college days. It takes you around the campus — seminar halls, bell tower and hostels — the popular hangout spots around the campus.
Produced by Vikram's IvyCap Ventures Advisors Private Limited, lyrics written by Ashish Tripathi and the video shot by Bombay Locale, the video is will take you back to college even if you are one of those 99.95% who never made it to IITs. For those 0.05% — reach out to endowment@iitd.ac.in for more details about the fund.
But it's not just a professionally shot going-back-to-college video that will just make you nostalgic. It calls the alumni, to be part of what Vikram and his friends call, a revolution. "More than 2 million students apply to get into the IITs each year. Less than 0.05% of them get into IIT Delhi," says the video. "IIT Delhi alumni run and manage companies with cumulative value of over USD 100 billion. Direct and indirect employment created by IIT-D alumni is over 30 million. And the institute continues to produce the best entrepreneurs in the world," adds the video that has a soulful tune sung by Vikram, who is the founder of IvyCap Ventures.
Of the 30+ unicorns (companies valued at USD 1 billion or more) founded by Indian Entrepreneurs, 15+ unicorns have been founded by IIT Delhi Alumni, says the opening credits. "Over 600 start-ups founded by IIT Delhi alumni have raised over USD 15 billion in funding so far. By far the largest as compared to any other educational institute in India," reminds the video. As IIT Delhi announces the launch of its Endowment Fund with a target corpus USD 1 billion by 2025 Vikram tells his fellow IITans that the institute "needs you to be a part of this revolution".
