SPJIMR’s TaSIC 2026 catalyses dialogue on responsible growth 

SPJIMR’s TaSIC 2026 catalyses dialogue on responsible growth 

Global scholars and industry leaders co-create actionable pathways for India’s sustainable, aspiration-led growth

MUMBAI, India, Feb. 23, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- ‘How can India meet rising consumer aspirations without compromising responsibility, resilience, and long-term societal well-being?’ This question anchored the two-day international Technology and Societal Impact Conference (TaSIC) 2026, hosted by Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan’s S.P. Jain Institute of Management & Research (SPJIMR) at its Mumbai campus on February 20 and 21. Designed as an Academic–Practice Sprint, the conference brought together global scholars, industry leaders, innovators, and policymakers to move beyond dialogue towards actionable solutions.

Research-led perspectives meet practice

The Academic Plenary on February 20 featured four internationally respected scholars who examined the intersection of technology, markets, and sustainability through complementary lenses. Prof. Joan Rodón Mòdol (Esade) explored how moral markets can scale without diluting founding values; Prof. Matteo Montecchi (King’s College London) presented the H.E.R.O.E.S. framework for embedding responsibility, resilience, and respect into marketing strategy; Prof. Khaled Hassanein (McMaster University) emphasised inclusive technology design and responsible AI; and Prof. Edward Sweeney (Heriot-Watt University) focused on the co-creation of sustainable, circular, and inclusive value chains.

In a synthesis roundtable, Prof. Varun Nagaraj, Dean, SPJIMR reframed these insights around a central provocation posed to both speakers and the audience: India’s aspiration–sustainability paradox: affordability versus sustainability, innovation versus regulation, and inclusion versus resource limits. SPJIMR’s second-year PGDM participants presented 12 pressing problem statements across five sectors, challenging the audience to respond not in theory, but in systems terms.

Their mapping revealed a single, uncomfortable insight: systemic interdependence. Environmental stress surfaced through single-use packaging, food loss, toxic e-waste, groundwater depletion, inefficient energy systems, and AI’s growing carbon footprint. Simultaneously, BNPL-driven debt, algorithm-led overconsumption, EV-linked job displacement, and rising non-communicable diseases exposed deepening socio-economic fragilities. Assumptions were challenged. Simplistic binaries were dismantled. The message was unequivocal: isolated interventions cannot solve interconnected failures.