JEE Prep LIED to You: Here's Why You Need To BUILD a Career After JEE | Propelld CEO on BP2B S2 Ep.5
Victor Senapaty (guest)
In this episode of Best Place To Build, featuring Victor Senapaty, JEE Prep LIED to You: Here's Why You Need To BUILD a Career After JEE | Propelld CEO on BP2B S2 Ep.5 explores jEE is just a start; build careers and education-finance trust Propelld is an education-finance NBFC lending to ~2.5 lakh students annually with ~₹1200 crore AUM and ~1% NPAs, far below the ~10% industry average cited in the conversation.
JEE is just a start; build careers and education-finance trust
Propelld is an education-finance NBFC lending to ~2.5 lakh students annually with ~₹1200 crore AUM and ~1% NPAs, far below the ~10% industry average cited in the conversation.
Their underwriting thesis treats education as a family investment and prices risk primarily using institute/course outcome quality rather than only individual borrower proxies typical of personal loans.
Victor’s path to Propelld ran through three earlier startups (planetarium-based astronomy education, hyperlocal grocery delivery, and apparel), which he frames as a practical MBA in product, scalability, and unit economics.
He argues JEE coaching sells a “half-truth” that admission is the end goal, while real progress comes from leveraging IIT as a platform to build skills, careers, and long-term direction.
Propelld’s conviction-driven decisions helped it grow during the pandemic and avoid exposure to the BYJU’S-linked credit blowups that damaged lender trust in education/edtech financing.
Key Takeaways
Education loans behave differently than personal loans—intent is structurally higher.
Propelld’s core bet is that learners and families treat education as an investment, so willingness to complete the course and repay is stronger than in consumption-driven personal loans.
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Underwriting can be improved by prioritizing institute-and-course outcome data.
Instead of relying mainly on borrower income/credit history proxies, Propelld optimizes for “wholesale risk” by validating the quality of institutions, programs, and their placement/outcome signals.
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Scaling lending safely is about buying the right risks, not avoiding risk entirely.
Victor frames lending as “evaluating and buying risk,” where wrong risks get punished via NPAs; consistent underwriting discipline builds long-term profitability and partner confidence.
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Crises reveal whether your business is built on a thesis or on opportunism.
During COVID, Propelld doubled down on the view that people upskill in downturns, while the BYJU’S episode showed the cost of funding products you don’t fully understand or can’t justify to end users.
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Avoiding concentrated exposure can be as important as finding growth.
Victor highlights lenders facing ~20% NPAs on BYJU’S-linked portfolios (sometimes ~50% of AUM), while Propelld’s lack of exposure protected balance-sheet health and credibility.
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Career-building after JEE needs explicit reframing: IIT is a starting platform, not the finish line.
He argues many students hit IIT with a false sense of “pinnacle achieved,” and would benefit from early counseling that emphasizes exploration, building, and leveraging peers/alumni/facilities.
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In Indian fintech, the model has shifted from ‘every app is a fintech’ to regulated, NBFC-like fundamentals plus tech-driven efficiency.
He describes a 2016–2019 expansion of digital rails and experimentation, followed by regulatory clampdowns due to illegal lending/collection practices, pushing the sector toward durable, compliant models using tech for underwriting and operations.
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Notable Quotes
“Education is an investment... it’s a family investment.”
— Victor Senapaty
“I always pictured it as... there’s a back gate, and there’s a sand beach starting from the back gate.”
— Victor Senapaty
“You were sold a lie... You’re not at an end goal now. You’re at a beginning point.”
— Victor Senapaty
“The mistakes we regret are less of commission and more of omission, things we didn’t do.”
— Host (Amrit)
“In lending, we think... you’re in the business of evaluating and buying risk.”
— Victor Senapaty
Questions Answered in This Episode
What specific outcome metrics (placements, salaries, completion rates, default history) do you rely on to score an institute/course, and how do you verify them against misreporting?
Propelld is an education-finance NBFC lending to ~2. ...
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You said you optimize for “wholesale risk” at the institute level—when do you expect to shift toward more student-level (retail) differentiation, and what data would make that viable?
Their underwriting thesis treats education as a family investment and prices risk primarily using institute/course outcome quality rather than only individual borrower proxies typical of personal loans.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
Propelld claims ~1% NPAs vs ~10% industry average: what underwriting or collections practices contribute most to that gap, and what trade-offs (e.g., lower approval rates) come with it?
Victor’s path to Propelld ran through three earlier startups (planetarium-based astronomy education, hyperlocal grocery delivery, and apparel), which he frames as a practical MBA in product, scalability, and unit economics.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
During COVID you doubled down while others pulled back—what internal leading indicators convinced you the thesis was working before NPAs proved it months later?
He argues JEE coaching sells a “half-truth” that admission is the end goal, while real progress comes from leveraging IIT as a platform to build skills, careers, and long-term direction.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
On BYJU’S, you said you avoided exposure because you didn’t understand the product’s value to parents—what is your checklist today to decide whether a new course/provider is financeable?
Propelld’s conviction-driven decisions helped it grow during the pandemic and avoid exposure to the BYJU’S-linked credit blowups that damaged lender trust in education/edtech financing.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
Transcript Preview
did you not at some point think, "Maybe startup life is not for me, let me go get a job?"
BYJU'S success or failure defined the entire ecosystem, which risk is a good risk and which risk is a bad risk, and there is a way of doing it, and so you guys should also be open about that. That's when that money flows in.
The mistakes we regret are less of commission and more of omission, things we didn't do-
Yeah
... rather than-
Yes
... the things we did.
Look, education is an investment. Uh, people plan for education. It's not a very individual investment, it's a family investment. Your traditional banks, uh, and NBFCs typically look at education not so different from how they would look at a personal loan. In my head, you know, there's a back gate, and there's a sand beach starting-
From the back gate [laughing]
... from the back gate. [laughing]
Hi, this is Amrit. We are at IIT Madras, my alma mater, and India's top university for people who like to build. We are here to meet some builders, ask them: What are you building? What does it take to build? And what makes IIT Madras the best place to build? [upbeat music] Hello, and welcome to the Best Place to Build Podcast. Today, we are sitting with Victor. Victor is the CEO and Co-Founder of Propelld. Uh, it's a Series C company in education financing. He's also a student here from 2007 to '11. Hi, Victor.
Hi, Amrit. Thanks for having me here.
Victor, let's start with the most obvious question. You represent a company called Propelld.
Yeah.
So can you start with what Propelld does?
So, um, Propelld does, uh, education financing. Uh, so we give out loans to students who are in need for, uh, education loans. So they want to pursue educational courses, and they are in need of funds, that's where we come in. Uh, we are an NBFC. We've been there since the last seven years now. Uh, we are close to a 1200 crores AUM right now. Uh, we give out loans, uh, up to at least, uh, 2.5 lakh students every year. Uh, I think we would be at par or probably higher than an SBI in terms of the number of students that we give out loans to. We have had, uh, you know, performance where our, uh, NPAs, uh, which is seen as a gold standard, uh, you know, in the NBFC industry, we have our NPAs close to around a 1% level, and we are near, near profitable, so...
Wait, wait, wait, I want to just ask you a little bit about that. NPA is non-performing asset, right?
Correct.
From a very layman perspective, NPA is when a person who has taken a loan is not returning the loan.
Correct.
Right?
You're absolutely right. As in if there are 100 people who have taken loans, how much of your money is coming back? How much of your money is lost? Uh, the money lost is basically your NPAs.
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