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Disclaimer: Bazinga is DU Beat’s weekly column of almost believable fake news!

In what is being considered a landmark partnership in the history of Delhi, the University of Delhi (DU) and Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) have joined hands for an upcoming venture in the middle of this year.

If our trusted sources are to be believed, the admissions season in DU this year would witness widespread promotion and advertisements like other private universities of India. Apart from full time ads on main FM stations, full page coverage in leading news dailies and posters and pamphlets across Delhi, Delhi metro would be roped in too for the cause.

Not only the internal wall units and hand supports of metro would be replete with DU cut offs, DU placements, Principals’ messages, VC’s vote of thanks and all, but the metro externally would be covered with photos of different DU fests, experiences of DU students, professors and interesting facts about the colleges.

“We saw the banks and real estate houses advertise their brands on metro. That’s when it clicked us that we could do something similar to get more people and attention to our prestigious university too.” said, Mr. Bechke Khajanewala, Marketing Executive, University of Delhi.

The additional sum for such promotion would be partly funded by government and partly eked out by a 15% fee hike for the students of ongoing batches.

“We at DU are always working to bring our University at an enviable position against competitors. We’d want all our students to be eyes and ears of DU and send in more such suggestions at [email protected].” added Mr. Khajanewala.

Bazinga is DU Beat’s weekly column of almost-believable fake news!

Image Credits- IndiaToday

 

After an action packed first day, day 2 of Shruti, the annual cultural fest of Indraprastha College for Women hosted several exciting events and competitions. The fest came to an end with an EDM night by DJ Aditya after much fanfare.

Taboo, the event organised by Oghma-The English Editorial Society saw 13 teams compete in the first round. Each team was given 7  general words with some Taboo-ed words. They had to make their partner guess the words without speaking out the Taboo words. The round saw lots of funny explanations and answers, and the event kept the fun element alive. 7 teams qualified to the second round and 4 to the third. The final two rounds raised the difficulty level as the participants had to guess names of specific characters, words and books with very constricting rules. In the end, three teams emerged victorious; First position went to Lavanya and Minal, Second to Shaonlee and Avani, and Third to Samira and Panya. There were participants from colleges like IIT-Delhi and St. Stephen’s College as well.

The Eco club along with the NSS of the college, organised a newspaper dressing competition. 16 teams across all colleges of DU participated actively and creatively in the competition. The competition saw creativity at its best, what with a number of teams opting to design a gown or a cocktail dress out of the newspapers, while one of them opted for a south-Indian traditional costume. One team made a costume of a prince from the eighteenth century Britain. Zakir Hussain College (Morning) bagged the first prize with their cocktail dress replete with frills, while IP college won the second prize for the look designed with the dress, and all accessories from footwear to bouquet to tiara. Third prize went to Sri Venkateswara College for the costume of a prince.

Hindi Debating society held a competition on the topic, “Inspite of the advancement of various means of effective expression and communication, there has been a degradation in the quality of effective expression.” Everyone talked about how effective communication is one which reaches the receiver, is understood by them and then their feedback is taken. Another unusual point discussed was how effective communication brought about a change in Nirbhaya case! Winners included Sonal Nigam from SGTB Khalsa, Nihita from IP college, Ratan Kumar from SGTB Khalsa as first, second and third prizes respectively. Best interjector was Rajkumar from SGND Khalsa.

Aalap, the classical music society organised Ninaad 2015 (group singing competition). There were a plethora of soulful renditions spanning all forms of classical music. First prize was bagged by KMC. The second prize went to Miranda house. Daulat Ram bagged the third.

Abhivyakti, the dramatics society organised Chauraha, the competitive street play competition. The theatre teacher at Manavsthali School and Mr. Neel Sengupta were the judges. With around 10 street play theatre teams participating in the event, it was a major crowd-puller. Abhivyakti members introduced each college’s street play team stating the teams’ dialogues, which was a major fun element. Gargi college won the first prize. SGTB Khalsa stole the show with the overall second prize and best performance and best music awards to its credit. Shivaji college won the third prize. Best Performers awards were given to Guneet Singh Nanda (SGTB Khalsa) and Shefali Vyas (Gargi College) Special mention went to Shaheed Sukhdev College of Business Studies. Other colleges performed equally well. Hansraj College performed a play on how our opinions are not entirely our own & are influenced by society, parents and friends.

Day 2 of Shruti ended with an EDM night with DJ Aditya and DJ Gauri who played both EDM and popular Bollywood music for more than 2000 students. They took selfies with the audience and enthralled everyone with a lively performance.

 

Writers: Kritika Narula, Ayesha Sareen and Surbhi Arora

The basic idea with which I live life is that one should make the most of every opportunity one gets.
Experiment, experience, and enjoy the maximum number of things possible.
An avid reader of Paulo Coelho’s novels, I totally believe in and agree with all his ideologies and philosophies. I also love to read people’s face and mind. Curiosity, drive and self confidence are the three things which make me live life to the fullest. 
Swimming is a sport I love the most and I also enjoy playing sitar.

reality-shows-in-indiaREAL FUN!

By Tanya Agarwal

A seventy year old man forced to admit to having slept with a prostitute as his tense wife and daughter look on, Rakhi Sawant fluttering her eyes at the camera and accusing participants in her Swyamvar of playing with her delicate heart, Gauhar Khan bursting into tears and piling all the blame for her bad dancing on her hapless choreographer… if you condemn such harmless, albeit theatrical entertainment and say it debases popular taste, then you’re just a puffed up snob who hasn’t yet tried watching the said shows, conveniently assuming that it’s for those with low intellect and no one but the likes of Udita Goswami to look to for amusement.

The supposedly blatant unreality of reality television creates the most unlikely situations and the reaction of the various pseudo celebrities featured in these shows is pure entertainment. It is precisely this that keeps even the cerebral people glued to shows like ‘Big Boss’ and ‘Sach Ka Saamna’. High brow attitudes are out of vogue and society sees no harm in being entertained by any kind of entertainment at all nowadays. Reality shows are the symbols of the age of mass culture that we live in today.

We are so accustomed to the petty dramas of everyday life that they’re no longer of much interest to us anymore. The lives of people like Manmohan Tiwari and Abhijeet Sawant played out on national television therefore, comes as a refreshing change, presenting us with a peek into a world exotically different from our monotonous, scheduled existence. It is amazing fun to watch celebrities on TV and find out how they actually are in real life and whether they truly live up to their typecast roles. It also funny to hear Anu Malik, the architect of songs like “do me a favour, let’s play holi” and “oonchi hai building”, pretend to be a connoisseur of music and dole out advice to participants. Once in a while, it’s good to just go with the deception and sit back and enjoy.

Reality shows not only keep us entertained but they are also a great platform for those with aptitude and willingness to work hard. These shows can be credited with churning out some pretty great talent, examples being Sunidhi Chauhan and Sonu Nigam – both hugely successful singers.

In the end, we are after all, a democracy. Neither is anyone compelled to participate in these shows, nor is anyone obliged to watch them. So cheers to those who can afford to step down from their high ground and appreciate some mindless fun, and to the rest, live and let live, people!

ISS REALITY TV SE MUJHE BACHAO

By Aina Mathew

If on one channel you have old men jumping up and cracking coconuts with their heads in the name of entertainment, on another rival one you get chubby little toothless girls prancing around dressed as bais, all to instigate laughter. While Shah Rukh tackles fifth graders, Salman has roti-making competitions with Mallika Sherawat. At absolutely no time of the day can you channel-surf without coming across at least ten reality shows featuring complete madcap behaviour. The idiot box is truly living up to its name these days.

With the overwhelming number of reality shows flooding our TV screens, you’d think we’d get to see fascinating, inventive programmes with something new being offered each day. On the contrary, almost all these shows are rip-offs of popular western shows. ‘Indian Idol’ is an exact copy of ‘American Idol’; ‘Is Jungle Se Mujhe Bachao!’ follows in the footsteps of ‘I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here!’; ‘Sach Ka Saamna’ is modeled exactly along the lines of ‘The Moment of Truth’ and so on and so forth, until originality, much less sense is the last thing you’d associate with Indian television. The format is the same, the rules are the same, and everything is the same except the quality, which falls dreadfully below tolerance levels. Our answer to Simon Cowell’s sharp, witty remarks is the sad shayari of Anu Malik who, by the way, takes up more footage than the participants themselves with his histrionics. While western audiences are left shaken by the candid confessions of participants on The Moment of Truth, we have to contend with the ramblings of retired cricketers. Why would anyone want to subject themselves to such torture?

I fail to understand why the producers of all these nutty programmes classify them under reality TV. Whether it’s a stand up comedy competition or a game show or a singing contest, it all eventually turns into a K-serial anyway. Drama, suspense, romance – name it and you have it. All the elements of an Ekta Kapoor hit are intrinsic to every “reality” show that have graced Indian television sets. More than their singing abilities, endurance levels or dancing skill, the talent that always comes out best among participants is their acting. With every elimination, rivals who couldn’t stand being in the same room without a torrent of beeps renting the air turn into friends for life who drown themselves in tears of remorse. Thanks to “reality” TV, our desi Pamela Anderson has turned into a blushing, demure sati savitri who gets a heart attack every time a potential husband so much as brushes against her little finger. If this is all the reality that TV can offer, I’d rather just revert to the saas bahu serials, thank you very much.

In conclusion, reality TV is a complete waste of time and energy. If anyone gains from these shows, it’s the medicine industry that now has a bigger market for headache pills and those resuscitated stars of yesteryears who can finally stop selling water purifiers and scream at wannabe dancers instead.