DUB Speak

Mirror, Mirror on the wall, which ‘fests’ do I attend of them all?

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Use your imagination! It is the morning sun shining through your window, summoning you to come out of the covers, you splash yourself with the steamy water, wear the best of your attires, clear the hazy mirror for some self admiration; suddenly you  catch the glance of your eye and ponder, ‘Where am I off to, though?’

“Water, water everywhere, not a drop to drink.” – this quote from S.T. Coleridge’s famous poem ‘The Rime of an Ancient Mariner’ befittingly describes the dilemma we, the students of DU, face; especially in the winter semester, wherein each date on the calendar associates with itself half a dozen of cultural carnivals, department fests, academic congresses, MUNs, panel discussions and similar fancy names taking place in several colleges across the university. The notice boards are replete with posters of all hues and sizes.

The past week was the perfect example to quote when it comes to simultaneous conduct of events in colleges. Miranda House’s Tempest, Kamala Nehru College’s Ullas, Hindu College’s Mecca and JMC’s Montage were the annual cultural fests coinciding on almost the same dates of 19th, 20th, 21st& 22nd February.  In addition to these, there was Deshbandhu College’s Sabrang and Ramjas College’s Mosaic Unplugged. Not only the college fests, but the department fests like Hansraj College’s Vanijya Utsav, SRCC’s Ecostasy and DCAC’s Quest had more or less overlapped each other. The list is not exhaustive of course, there are numerous other clashes; to the extent that, big colleges like SRCC [Fest of Eco & Fine Arts] andHindu [Fest of Commerce & History], have different departmental fests going on together causing chaos, confusion and reduced footfall.

Moreover, numerous big stars’ performances happen back to back. Hard Kaur performs one day, Kailasa the next day coinciding with Papon. This is followed by Arijit Singh on the next day and Mohit Chauhan towards the end. The crowd is of students after all, who have to juggle parental concerns, attendance and internal exams that have begun in most of the colleges.

All in all, hosting a plethora of events on a single date does practically no good to anyone, the endeavours made by organising team get a cold response,lower than that it potentially could have got. The crowd of spectators and participants gets distributed; and at times students even miss out on some posters, or if at all they read, it all skips the mind completely. Students with fests in their own colleges have to either ditch their loyalties or have to let go of a major fest.Performing societies have to juggle multiple performances in a day sometimes the number going up to three and four. Moreover, the organisers of one event don’t get to see and learn from the mistakes and qualities of others zeroing the objectives of holding these fests.

Hence, in the best interest of everyone, the fests should not ideally clash; the organisers should keep in mind the taken dates, and encourage healthy competition providing congenial atmosphere to learn and enjoy. The DU Beat events calendar can prove to be a blessing in disguise for that matter!

‘Happy Festing’ fellow DU-ites!

Image Credit: Gurman Bhatia for DU Beat

Mridul Sharma is a final year B.Com (Honors) aspirant from DCAC, a patron of meaningful cinema and good soft music and has deep love for writing. He is more of a poet, feels whatever he writes and writes to understand what he feels, a little better. Currently, the Associate Web Editor at DU Beat, he is looking forward to his final year and can be contacted at [email protected]

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