Cultural Events

Freshers’ Fiesta and Flair, which are usually conducted in the Freshman year, are being conducted in the middle of the 3rd semester for the UG2k20 batch. Also, due to the online semester, many students are unaware of how competitive these events are every year. We will try to address some questions along these lines such as what the Cultural Council, the body responsible for organising these events actually is, why weren’t events organised by it last year, and the general outlook towards Freshers’ events usually taken, among the others. The Cultural Secretary, Rhuthik P, and the Joint Secretary Dhruvee Birla, of the Cultural Council, have been interviewed and their replies to questions have also been included. 

The Cultural Council is an all-student body comprising a secretary, joint secretary, house captains, and house representatives, which is responsible for conducting inter-house competitions, freshers’ events (such as Flair), and celebrating certain occasions such as days of national importance. The position of joint secretary is a new addition to the structure of the cultural council.

The council believes that Freshers’ events are some of the most memorable moments for most college students, and thus thinks that it would have been very disappointing for the UG2k20 batch not to have those events last year. The council deferred the decision to conduct freshers’ competitions in hopes that the college would open offline soon and since events such as flair are way better offline. But that did not happen, unfortunately. That is why they are being held online now.  

Although the council had successfully organised some events on Republic Day, Mother Tongue Day, etc., they could not conduct events online for students in the past year despite many clubs doing so (with very good turnout). This is due to a variety of reasons. First, house competitions have different categories such as music, dance, and sports, which are suited to be conducted offline. Having multiple scopes also requires more organizers than a typical club event. It is interesting to note that the Cultural Council is smaller than many clubs even though the events they conduct are on a bigger scale. In addition, there is active competition among people from different houses in these events since points will be awarded for the house cup to winners’ houses. Also, people from every house must participate in good numbers for the events to be successful. This could be done to some extent in the offline semester since seniors could encourage people from their houses to take part. Even now, they claim they are able to conduct these events because they know UG2k20 people to some extent and can get them to participate.  

In order to increase participation, especially considering the fact that the UG2k20 batch isn’t as pumped up about the inter-house rivalry as the previous batches, intra-house meets were conducted in the run-up to the house competitions in order to inculcate competitiveness and increase participation. The cultural council has also started social media accounts on platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube to promote the events, along with a Discord server with all the houses. The responsibility to get juniors to participate, at least partly, rests on the house captains and the house representatives. However, there are limits to how much one can do online. So, this year, the council is relying on other forms of hype than inter-house rivalry as well to get more people on board.  

The event for crowning Mr. and Ms. Flair is being held online for the first time. The organisers are conducting it similar to its offline counterpart, as much as possible. The first round was an internal screening within the house for each house. Then, for the second round, a talent show was streamed live on YouTube. This will soon be followed by an interview for the third round to mark the end of this event, where they will test how well one can express their opinion and speak confidently. Based on the performances of the participants, the titles Mr. and Ms. Flair will be awarded to the winners in male and female categories, and the winning house will be given points for the house championship.  

(Not So) Freshers’ Fiesta and the second round of Flair were held on 24th October. Both of them were YouTube premieres of performances from all the houses. Freshers’ Fiesta was a mixture of group and individual performances in dance, singing, EDM, and other forms of music, etc. Each house was given approximately 10 minutes of screen time. Akash was declared the winner with Vayu coming a close second, followed by Agni and Prithvi.

Flair round-two premiered right after Fiesta where various students from almost all the houses actively participated. People showcased their talents not only in dance and music but also in fields such as art (normal and digital), decorating cakes, EDM, even solving Rubic’s cubes! Eight people got selected for round-three of which four are from Akash, three from Vayu, and one from Agni.

Coming to events for the incoming UG2k21 batch, the council does not have any plans in the online semester for now in hopes that the next semester would be offline for them, in which case, they will have offline freshers’ events and continue the tradition. 

Editors: Pahulpreet Singh, Srujana Vanka