Chandra Bhople

Chandra Bhople
Born	1958 Arvi, Wardha, Maharashtra
Residence	Nagpur, India & San Jose, California
Alma mater	BITS Pilani
Known for	Management Education, BITS Pilani Alumni Initiatives

Chandra Bhople is an acknowledged mentor^[1], entrepreneur and educationist with active involvement in management and engineering education in India.^[2]He is a global professional having worked in 6 countries such as India, USA, Canada, Australia, Singapore and Middle East. He established community driven educational initiative in management education in India called OCTAVE Business School^[3]. Chandra takes special interest in mentoring students and young entrepreneurs. Globally, he helps in the expansion of BITS Pilani Alumni Association ^{[4] [5]} leveraging the power of Generation Y. He spends his time in San Jose, California and Nagpur, India.

Early Life

Chandra Bhople (Chandrashekhar Bhople) was born in Arvi in Wardha district; a small town in Vidarbha region of Maharashtra. A son of a local Post Master, he was brought up in a middle class family of two sisters and one brother. Upon completion of his high school with merit rank from the economically backward district of Yeotmal, he went to Birla Institute of Technology & Science Pilani to pursue bachelor’s degree in Electrical & Electronics Engineering and post graduate education in Business Management. He was a recipient of Merit Scholarship from State Government of Maharashtra. During his college days he held various leadership positions in the areas of sports and students’ mess system. His mother tongue is Marathi and he speaks fluent Hindi and English.

Education

Chandra received Bachelors of Electrical & Electronics Engineering (BE Hons.) and Master of Management Studies (MMS) from Birla Institute of Technology & Science, Pilani (BITS Pilani).

Initial Years

Chandra started his career with ORG Systems, Secunderabad in Sales & Marketing department. Subsequently he worked for ICIM India, then the Indian subsidiary of ICL UK. Later he moved to Saudi Arabia to work for Wang Labs. After 4 years he came back to India and joined HCL Ltd. in the Mainframe Group which promoted IBM Plug-compatible mainframes in India. After spending some timed with HCL in Delhi and Bangalore, Chandra moved to Singapore to work for Digital Equipment (DEC) and later took over the Asia-Pacific business responsibility for a Norwegian GIS company.

Career and Business Interests

He started his career in India and subsequently worked in Middle East, Singapore, Australia, USA and Canada. He worked with Global companies such as Sun Microsystems, Digital Equipment, Wang, HCL, TechSpan (now Headstrong), Osellus and Karma Candy.

Educational Projects in India

Since 2006, he is actively involved in the education sector in India. In 2007, he co-founded Nuva College of Engineering & Technology in Nagpur, Central India ^[6] . In 2009, he brought large number of alumni of BITS Pilani together to start OCTAVE Business Schools in India.

References

1. ^ Press Release in Lokmat of Marketing Seminar delivered at VIA Forum
2. ^ Article on Management Education in DNA Pune, India.
3. ^ Director – Operations of OCTAVE Business School
4. ^ Board of Directors of BITSAA Silicon Valley Chapter
5. ^ Board member of BITSAA International
6. ^ Co-founder and Director of Nuva College of Engineering & Technology, Nagpur