To solve this problem, the Planning Commission in 1959 invited Professor George Robbins of the University of California to help in setting up an all India level institute of management studies.

During the initial years of IIM Calcutta, its core team included Paul Samuelson, Jagdish Sheth, J K Sengupta, Peter S King, and Thomas Hill.

The foundation stone of the current IIM-C campus in Joka, Kolkata, was laid by Morarji Desai, who was then the Deputy Prime Minister of India on 15 December 1968.

[11] The main campus of IIM Calcutta, covering 135 acres (0.5 km2) of area, is located in Joka, on the outskirts of Kolkata, India.

The Auditorium at IIM Calcutta, popularly called the Audi, hosts most of the important functions in the campus like the convocation, conferences, student events and talks.

[11] It houses over 160,000 volumes and also subscribes to hundreds of management journals and provides access to a large collection of electronic databases.

The library processes and functions are fully computerized and in addition to print material, it provides access to more than 40,000 online full-text journals.

[16] The lab is aimed to help in academic programmes, research on financial markets, product design and testing, executive education and in organising international and national conferences on finance.

From 2025 the institute started multiple courses for convergence of verious disciplines in inclusivity, sustainability, challenges firms face, and regional transformation in the MBA programme.

[citation needed] The new campus plan and the new buildings are designed by the architect Christopher Charles Benninger of Pune, India.

[35] Intaglio, usually held over a 3-day weekend in January, serves as a platform facilitating the interaction of eminent personalities from the industry, academia, media and government, holding conferences, workshops and seminars by experts in different fields on a wide range of topics.

[43] The major regular events at Intaglio include:[44] Carpe Diem is the annual cultural fest organised by the students of IIM Calcutta.

[45] The major regular events at Carpe Diem are:[46] Lattice is the annual business symposium organized by the MBAEx (formerly PGPEX) students of IIM Calcutta.

It attracts guests from different spheres of Indian industry, society, IIM Calcutta alumnus, and students from different business schools.

It provides a platform for participants from Indian institutes to come together and showcase their talent in business skills, music, dance, quizzing, sports, creativity, theatre, and literary events.

[49] Notable alumni include Krishnamurthy Subramanian, Ajit Balakrishnan, Sunil Duggal, Ramachandra Guha, Indra Nooyi, Shyam Srinivasan, Amish Tripathi, Gopal Vittal and Swami Mukundananda.

Past and present faculty at IIM Calcutta include many prominent scholars such as management educationist Ravi J. Matthai, economists Paul Samuelson, Ashok Mitra, Yoginder K Alagh and Deepak Nayyar, statisticians Warren Bennis, Jagdish Sheth and Rahul Mukerjee, anthropologist Surajit Chandra Sinha, and historians Barun De and Rajat Kanta Ray.