Pullela Gopichand

Pullela Gopichand is a former Indian badminton player who is currently the Chief National Coach of the Indian
Badminton team. Gopichand won the All England Open Badminton Championships in 2001 and became the second
Indian to achieve this feat after Prakash Padukone. He started the Gopichand Badminton Academy and is a recipient
of the Arjuna Award (1999), the Dronacharya Award (2009) and the Padma Bhushan – India's third highest civilian
award – in 2014.

Some of the top badminton players coached by him include Saina Nehwal, P. V. Sindhu, Parupalli Kashyap,
Srikanth Kidambi, Arundhati Pantawane, Gurusai Datt and Arun Vishnu.

Dr. Bala V. Balachandran

Great Lakes was set up in 2004 by Bala Balachandran, J.L. Kellogg Distinguished Professor of Accounting and
Information Management at Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, USA.[4]
Following the establishment of Indian School of Business (ISB), Balachandran wanted to establish a business school
in his home state of Tamil Nadu, and set up the Great Lakes Institute of Management in the capital city
of Chennai with a model similar to the ISB involving a one year MBA programme, global visiting faculty and
international academic collaborations.[5][6]
The first intake was for 127 students for its one-year programme and classes were held in a small rented building
in Saidapet, a residential neighbourhood in Chennai city. Great Lakes developed a new greenfield campus at
Manamai village near Mahabalipuram, a UNESCO Heritage Site 50 km south of Chennai, and shifted to this campus
in 2009.[7]
The regulatory body for technical and management education in India, AICTE, also did not have a provision for
approving one-year programmes. However, Great Lakes received approval for its PGPM from AICTE, the first
instance of an approval for a one-year programme in the country.
Great Lakes is accredited by the Association of MBAs (AMBA), UK,[10] one of the three main global accreditation
bodies in business education. Great Lakes is the youngest and 7th institute in India to get accreditation from the
association. Great Lakes Institute of Management, Chennai is accredited by SAQS (South Asian Quality Assurance
System).[11]
Great Lakes’ PGPM and PGDM full-time programmes are approved by All India Council for Technical Education
(AICTE),[12] a statutory body for technical education, under Ministry of HRD, Govt. of India. Great Lakes’ Chennai
campus is a LEED Platinum Rated Green Campus [13]