Best Place To BuildJEE Prep LIED to You: Here's Why You Need To BUILD a Career After JEE | Propelld CEO on BP2B S2 Ep.5
CHAPTERS
- 0:22 – 6:50
Why education loans behave differently than personal loans (Propelld’s core insight)
Victor explains Propelld’s central thesis: education is an investment made by families, so intent to repay and long-term ability are structurally higher than in typical consumption loans. He contrasts how banks underwrite education like personal loans versus Propelld’s outcome-driven approach.
- •Education is a family investment; ROI accrues to the household and community
- •Traditional underwriting overweights current salary/assets and credit history
- •Education borrowers often have higher intent to complete and repay
- •Ability to repay is tied to future income growth post-course
- •This framing supports lower default rates when evaluated correctly
- 6:50 – 8:53
Outcome-based underwriting at scale: focusing on institute and course quality
The conversation shifts from theory to implementation: how to make risk decisions across lakhs of borrowers in a noisy Indian credential landscape. Victor describes a ‘wholesale risk’ approach—standardizing and validating institute/course outcome data rather than trying to pick winners student-by-student everywhere.
- •Scale challenge: grades/marksheets can be inconsistent and gamed
- •Propelld optimizes for risk understanding, not maximum credit expansion
- •Primary signals: institute quality, course quality, verified outcomes
- •Build feedback loops to validate published placement/outcome claims
- •Start with ‘wholesale’ institutional risk before granular retail selection
- 8:53 – 13:07
Victor’s early entrepreneurship: portable planetarium to hyperlocal delivery to apparel
Victor recounts his first three startups and what each taught him about building. The progression moves from a product/service experiment (astronomy) to a scale-but-loss-making model (hyperlocal grocery) to a high-margin business (apparel).
- •Startup #1 Astroworks: teaching astronomy via a portable planetarium (2014–2015)
- •Startup #2 StockUp: hyperlocal grocery delivery; traction increased losses
- •Key lesson: unit economics can worsen with scale if the model is flawed
- •Startup #3 Pristine Cut: apparel with strong margins and real profitability
- •These ventures functioned as a ‘practical MBA’ in building
- 13:07 – 15:21
Co-founder origins and persistence: school friends, shared journeys, and ‘keep trying’
Victor explains how his co-founders came from long-standing relationships and how that continuity enabled multiple attempts. He also addresses the psychological question of whether he ever considered giving up and taking a job, framing shutdowns as learning-driven choices.
- •Bibhu and Brijesh were known since school in Bhubaneswar; long shared history
- •Co-founder continuity across multiple ventures enabled faster iteration
- •He did consider getting a job, but reframed each attempt as growth
- •Shutdowns were often intentional choices, not just failures
- •Entrepreneurship as iterative skill-building across product, scale, and profit
- 15:21 – 21:56
Propelld’s origin story: choosing a bigger, higher-impact problem
Propelld began with Bibhu’s idea while Victor and Brijesh were running an apparel business. They chose to shut down a profitable venture to pursue education financing because it was larger in scale and impact, rooted in the rising cost barrier to education.
- •Propelld was Bibhu’s idea; Victor and Brijesh joined full-time
- •They closed Pristine Cut to focus on a bigger opportunity
- •Rising education costs reduce affordability and exclude students mid-course
- •Belief: financing can prevent dropouts and widen access
- •Education positioned as a societal good, not just private consumption
- 21:56 – 25:15
Why IIT Madras: counseling, campus myths, and the ‘beach from the back gate’ story
Victor narrates how he chose IIT Madras over closer options like Kharagpur, influenced by senior advice and parental beliefs about discipline in the South. The chapter blends practical admissions-era decision-making with personal campus expectations versus reality.
- •Physical counseling era: visiting Kharagpur shaped his initial hesitation
- •A senior ‘sold’ Madras as fun and beach-adjacent (with a humorous misconception)
- •Parents supported the South India choice based on cultural stereotypes of rigor
- •Early campus life realities: logistics like losing the bicycle; beach isn’t effortless
- •Sets up his later reflection on underutilizing campus opportunities
- 25:15 – 28:51
The ‘JEE prep lied to you’: admission isn’t the end goal—building starts after you enter
A key theme emerges: JEE coaching frames admission as the finish line, creating a psychological plateau once students arrive at IIT. Victor argues students need early reframing and counseling to see IIT as a launchpad for building, exploration, and long-term ambition.
- •Post-JEE: many feel they’ve reached the pinnacle and stop pushing further
- •Victor proposes counseling at entry: ‘you were sold a half-truth’
- •IIT offers peers, facilities, alumni examples—use it as a beginning point
- •Focus should shift from exam optimization to opportunity exploration
- •This mindset later influenced his own career decisions
- 28:51 – 32:28
Placements as a reality check: from objective scores to subjective evaluation
Victor describes placements as the first intense encounter with real-world judgment across multiple dimensions, unlike the single-score logic of JEE/CGPA. He shares the stress of being unplaced for many days and how it triggered his resolve to stop missing opportunities.
- •Placements introduce multi-parameter, subjective evaluation (communication, grooming, fit)
- •Preparation uncertainty: every company values different skills
- •High stress environment shared by the entire graduating batch
- •Victor’s experience of delayed placement became a turning point
- •Lesson: regret often comes from omissions—what you didn’t attempt
- 32:28 – 34:00
MBA at FMS: rediscovering learning and going deep into finance competitions
Victor explains how he approached FMS Delhi as a platform to fully utilize, in contrast to his under-optimized IIT years. He pursued finance interests beyond academics through projects and global competitions, reigniting curiosity and depth-driven learning.
- •Intentional platform utilization: ‘fully use what you’re given’
- •Work beyond coursework: finance projects and global competitions
- •Reconnecting with the joy of deep learning (pre-JEE curiosity)
- •Building domain conviction that later supports entrepreneurship
- •Personal transformation: from passive achievement to active exploration
- 34:00 – 38:59
Investment banking to entrepreneurship: impatience, learning velocity, and the leap
After landing a coveted investment banking job, Victor realized the work didn’t match expectations and that early-career tasks felt low-learning. He frames his departure as ‘right impatience’—choosing faster learning loops via building rather than waiting for status-based progression.
- •Dream job reality gap: intellectually stimulating work often comes later
- •Early-stage corporate work can be visibility-driven and repetitive
- •Impatience as a strategic choice when learning is low
- •Host echoes similar experience, contrasting ‘too soon’ vs ‘right time’
- •This decision sets up the startup sequence leading to Propelld
- 38:59 – 40:53
Early Propelld go-to-market: calling institutes, finding one believer, and piloting in Kolkata
Victor recounts Propelld’s scrappy beginnings: cold-calling institutes, hearing many no’s, and then partnering with a forward-looking institute leader in Kolkata. Being on-site allowed them to deeply understand promoter quality, student ambition, and outcomes—making initial lending safer and more informed.
- •Initial GTM was manual: phone outreach to institutes
- •Breakthrough came via a US-exposed institute founder who saw the future product
- •On-the-ground discovery: speaking directly with students to learn needs
- •Pilot focused on small-ticket loans for upskilling (e.g., data science)
- •Physical proximity reduced uncertainty and validated the underwriting approach
- 40:53 – 44:31
Scaling Propelld: from 3 founders to 300+ team—signals vs noise and organizational alignment
Victor describes how both the company and he changed as they scaled to hundreds of partner institutes and a large team. The core leadership shift was learning to separate signal from noise, pick top priorities, and create organizational structures that keep everyone rowing in one direction.
- •Growth arc: founders pitching → tiny office → 300–350 team
- •Expansion to ~600–700 institutes (approx.) and broader education categories
- •Leadership skill: distinguishing signals from noise and prioritizing top inputs
- •Balancing long-term durable value with short-term tactical wins
- •Building ‘an organization’: alignment, structure, and people management
- 44:31 – 51:23
Pandemic playbook: contrarian conviction, board pressure, and NPA as proof
Contrary to expectations that lenders would suffer, Propelld doubled down during COVID, betting that crises increase demand for upskilling and education. Victor explains tough board conversations, the importance of conviction, and how stable NPAs validated the strategy while enabling them to leapfrog better-funded competitors.
- •Contrarian thesis: uncertainty drives people to invest in education and skills
- •Boardroom skepticism: why ‘open the tap’ when others pull back
- •Education loans framed as investment with strong intent even in crisis
- •Stable NPAs served as the ultimate validation in a lending business
- •Crisis became a chance to gain market leadership and industry trust
- 51:23 – 58:26
The BYJU’S fallout: avoiding mispriced risk and rebuilding lender trust in education
Victor frames the BYJU’S meltdown as an ecosystem-wide trust shock that made lenders wary of education. Propelld benefited by sticking to its underwriting principles, avoiding exposure to products they didn’t understand, and positioning themselves as a disciplined, long-term risk-pricing partner to lenders.
- •BYJU’S success/failure shaped edtech sentiment and capital flows
- •Mis-selling and concentrated lender exposure led to severe NPAs for some players
- •Education category trust declined after losses; lenders pulled back
- •Propelld had no BYJU’S exposure due to course-level conviction and clarity
- •Mission: build lender trust by pricing ‘good risk vs bad risk’ transparently
- 58:26 – 1:04:48
How fintech lending evolved in India: regulation cycles and tech as efficiency (not hype)
Victor outlines three phases of Indian fintech: early opening of digital rails (eKYC, P2P, penetration push), followed by clampdowns due to illegal lending apps and abusive collections, leading to a return toward traditional NBFC-style models. Tech remains central, but primarily to improve underwriting, monitoring, and operational efficiency within regulated frameworks.
- •Fintech is highly regulated for consumer protection and systemic stability
- •Phase 1 (2016–2019): digital rails expand; licenses and experimentation increase
- •Phase 2: illegal apps/collection abuses trigger regulatory tightening
- •Phase 3: business models look more traditional; tech drives efficiency and risk control
- •Propelld’s tech focus: institutional risk models, monitoring triggers, process automation
