Shubham Kaushik, Author at DU Beat - Delhi University's Independent Student Newspaper

Writing has never been difficult for me. I am better with words on paper than I am with words in speech. That was the idiosyncrasy that led me to DU Beat as a disillusioned first year student undergoing an identity crisis. However, as I sat down to write this Farewell note at the end of my time with this platform, I found myself at a loss for words. It’s clearly not easy saying goodbye to something that has been an integral part of my identity for the past three years.

DU Beat has continued to grow by leaps and bounds since its inception ten years ago, and it was an absolute honour to have had the chance to influence this growth during a period that saw great tumult and radical changes in the world, especially in the student community. We were at the forefront of covering important issues around the University throughout the year, including the DUSU elections and the events at Ramjas College earlier this year, and proudly stuck to our motto of ‘Freedom of Expression’.

What makes DU Beat great, apart from the fact that we are the one of the biggest campus publications in the country, is the amount and diversity of the opportunities it has to offer. Some apply looking for an internship experience, others do it for the want of a platform that gives space to their talent which their academic life has no scope for, and yet others – like yours truly – do it in search of a purpose to keep themselves engaged and energised during the course of their otherwise drab college lives. Everyone gets what they are looking for, and more. Working at DU Beat isn’t just writing articles, meeting deadlines and covering events. It is also finding yourself in unexpected situations and learning to adapt in order to come out at the top. It is on-ground, real-world experience that’s hard to come by for 20-year-old students so early in their career. It is finding kaleidoscopic minds coming together for riveting conversations who become teammates to work with and friends to depend on and meet outside of work. It is gruelling, challenging yet rewarding work, and laughter, appreciation and unwinding with a team that starts feeling like family. It was all of that for me for the past three years – a purpose, a family, a constant. By the end of your time here, you don’t realise most of the voids you came with because this place finds a way to fill them.

Out of all the things we achieved this year – from the increases in our readership to experimenting successfully with live platforms – I am the most proud of the team we’ve managed to put together. It is with a heavy heart but immense confidence that I leave this team we built in the capable leadership of Vineeta Rana, as the Editor for the year 2017-18, and Srivedant Kar, as the Associate Editor. With the satisfaction of having seen everyone in the team grow not only as journalists but also as people, I sign off from my duties as the Editor for 2016-17.

Shubham Kaushik

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DUB Speak

Dasvidanya Delhi University

By Shubham Kaushik April 12, 2017

As third years, are we saying goodbye to our years as undergraduate students in Delhi University or are we saying goodbye to the University as we knew it?

Shubham Kaushik ([email protected])

It’s that time of the year when another batch of undergraduate students from the University of Delhi are getting ready to bid their colleges goodbye. Farewell gatherings are being prepared for with as much gusto as various entrance exams. While it’s natural for third year students to worry about their future and be nostalgic about their time in the University, it is also important in the current scenario to worry about the university we’re leaving behind.

Recent events suggest that Delhi University is no longer the space it used to be a few years ago. Whether this change was in the making for a while or was caused by a few specific events is debatable but it has manifested itself in events occurring around us for the past few months. The subtle nationwide suppression of dissent and revolt against the authoritarian regimes in educational spaces reached the University in its most recognisable form with what transpired in Ramjas College a month ago. The University, which was known for the freedom it gave to students to explore their beliefs and critically analyse the dominant rhetoric, turned into a violent space where students and teachers were targeted and assaulted for doing what shouldn’t just be acceptable but also encouraged in a university space – standing up for freedom, demanding their right to dissent and challenging what years of social conditioning made them believe. When safe spaces meant for exploration and exchanges of ideas are ravaged by forces that aim to homogenise them, it doesn’t bode well for the society at large. This world wasn’t meant for the establishment of one system followed by the majority population with the others coerced to follow suit, and past attempts to do so have always resulted in bloodshed and eventual revolutions that did what had to be done anyway – put the system in motion again and allowed conflicting stances to clash and coexist.

As we’re getting ready to say goodbye to our days as undergraduate students in Delhi University, we must make sure we aren’t also saying goodbye to the university space as we knew it. Spare a thought for seminars being disrupted even as other seminars ‘nationalising’ teaching are organised. Spare a thought for the thousands of students who still look towards DU to mould their future and their beliefs, and who will then go on to mould our society. Spare a thought for the future of Delhi University.

Image Credits: The Wire

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Hindu College

Colleges Under University of Delhi Planning to Seek Autonomous Status

By Shubham Kaushik March 28, 2017

A few prestigious institutions under the University of Delhi, namely, St. Stephen’s College, Hindu College, Ramjas College, Shri Ram College of Commerce and colleges run by theDelhi Sikh Gurudwara Management Committee, have expressed the desire of achieving a deemed university status. The proposals are at very initial stages, but if granted, these colleges will have the power to formulate their own rules and fee structures which will not adhere to the functioning of Delhi University.

The matter was raised in the governing body meeting of Hindu college, and it was declared that in later stages if a college wants a deemed university status, they must have an ‘A grade’ accreditation under NAAC for 3 consecutive years. A senior university official stated, “Few colleges like SRCC, Stephen’s, Ramjas, Hindu and the ones run by the Delhi Sikh Gurudwara Management Committee want deemed university status. The Union Human Resource Development Ministry has also formulated some norms for providing more autonomy to colleges but deemed status will give them complete freedom of functioning on their own”. It has been speculated that if this status is granted to any of these colleges, they will not be bound by any of the rules and regulations of Delhi University, and thus there will be no need to seek sanctions from the University for any decision. Despite of all these proposals, it has also been speculated that the Student Unions of these colleges might oppose this move because the college will then have a liberty of deciding their own fee structure, and thus there might be a price hike in the fee which would make affordability a great reason of concern for many students.

St. Stephen’s College has already been in a tussle with the University of Delhi for the past couple of years regarding an autonomous status. Attempts to reach out to the Student Union of the college for their comments were unsuccessful.

By Joyee Bhattacharya ([email protected])

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Uncategorized

A Miranda House student sexually harassed at SRCC’s fest

By Shubham Kaushik March 11, 2017

Meghna Singh, a student of Miranda House, recently went through a horrific incident when she attended KK’s concert of the last day of SRCC’s annual fest, Crossroads. When she came home from the concert, she noticed white spots on her black trousers. According to her, a man had masturbated on her during the concert and the evidence was all over her trousers.

She described the whole incident on Facebook. In her now widely shared Facebook post, she explained the details of the entire incident. She narrated that she could sense something fishy when she felt a guy behind her in the concert. Subsequently, she and her friends, who were scared but alert, held each other on to form a human chain during the concert for protection. She had put up the Facebook post on a public platform in hopes that people would get to know about the harrowing things that can happen to women, even in public and to stand up against such incidents. But instead of the support she was expecting, she got mocked at and trolled. and she was labeled a ‘liar’ and an ‘attention seeker’. On her Facebook post, which has over 8000 comments, many shockingly accused her of being a ‘liar’ and an ‘attention seeker’. This translated into a extensive battle-ground with many people in support of her rubbishing such claims and extending their sympathies to her.

The picture posted by Meghna Singh on Facebook while narrating the incident.

The unprecedented trolling that Meghna faced, forced her to post another status update explaining herself. She explained the hollowness of the claims made by those who opposed her and thoroughly explained the incident further. She said that initially, she didn’t realise what was happening and it was only after coming back to her PG and changing, she noticed the spots on her trousers. She also added, “There was a guy right behind me who,after a while, started feeling me up. I wasn’t sure as I couldn’t recognise if it was his hand or his fingers. Then after a while I could smell the odour, I could feel that something fell on my left leg which I thought might have been sweating and since the place was quite crowded I couldn’t be sure about it.” After the guy tried to get closer again, she along with her friends resisted him and tried to form a human chain to avoid any accidental touches. “After a while, that guy again tried to get closer when I pushed him away shouting “Please bhai tum niklo yahan se” then he whispered something to his fellow partner. They were 3 guys who were there & they exchanged some gestures and then abruptly left. After I returned to my PG and changed, I saw these spots on my pants along with some white discharge. I realised that my intuition of “sweat landing on my left leg” was actually his semen because of his convenient masturbation amongst the crowd of around hundreds of people.”

“We obviously thought we avoided that situation when she pushed him so we went back home,” says Antara Kashyap, one of Meghna’s friend who was there with her at the time. When Meghna found out what had happened, her friends asked her to speak up about it.“She sent us the picture in a WhatsApp group saying it was semen. It smelled and it was definitely discharge. We asked her to put it on Facebook and speak up about it. It was the right thing to do. The first negative comment was from an old “friend” who laughed it off. Then one guy said it could be srikhand and it shocked us.”

Meghna and her friends had not anticipated so many negative comments on the post. Antara said, “We never realised there would be thousands of such people, literate ones at that, who’d comment, slut-shame her and make this something to laugh about. Meghna and all of us, we have gone through a lot. We don’t deserve this hate. Meghna is a strong girl, she’s unfazed. I can’t say that about myself. Maybe that’s why thousands of victims of sexual abuse do not speak up. If you speak up they try to break you down.”

Meghna’s post was meant for people to see the unspeakable truths of harassment which are not absent in the campus, especially during the fest season. Parismita Talkudar, one of Meghna’s classmate, recounts a similar story, “I went to see one of my favourite star of Bollywood. We waited for 3 hours to have a glimpse of Shah Rukh Khan at Hansraj College last year. We were surrounded with a whole lot of people and we decided to stay together holding each other. One of my friend was behind a guy who looked innocent . In fact when some people were pushing her, he told them not to. When SRK came after so long, the crowd pushed each other like a wave and we got separated. There was a guy who helped me get out of the crowd. As I waited outside the ground for my friends I saw one of them almost in tears. The guy who was behind her, and who we thought was a nice person, actually came on her. She was disgusted as she could feel something wet on her top and when we looked at it, we could clearly see semen. This isn’t something that happened for the first time only with Meghna. This happens, with a lot of girls. But some decide to keep quiet.”

Featured Image: thealternative.in

Anagha Rakta

[email protected]

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S.G.T.B Khalsa College

Street play event postponed in SGTB Khalsa on police recommendation

By Shubham Kaushik February 23, 2017

Ankur, the theatre society of Shri Guru Tegh Bahadur Khalsa College, have postponed their street play competition, Pratyaksh, which was being organised in the Nukkad on the second day of the college’s annual cultural festival, Lashkara.

Day 1 of Lashkara on February 22 saw myriad competitive events by a plethora of societies, metres away the violence and chaos that erupted in the north campus mid-day onwards. Disrupting a peaceful march by students and teachers to protest against the intervention by the ABVP of an academic conference at Ramjas College, the student political party blocked the entrance of Ramjas College. Violence erupted in front of the college campus with students also stuck inside the college premises for hours.

Following reports and warnings advising students against entering the college campus after the events of February 22, the cultural festival observed a low turnout on February 23. The theatre society’s street play event, organised for the second day, was set to witness participation from majority of colleges around the campus. The street play events during Delhi University festivals are known for raising pertinent issues about the prevailing social and cultural issues, often on taboo and lesser-discussed themes.

“The DUSU president asked us to call off the competition as elements from different plays might be construed negatively in the current political environment. The police also appealed to us to call off the event in the interest of restoring peace and normalcy in the campus. The administration had to take the call of cancelling the event to ensure safety of students,” said Saikat Ghosh, staff advisor of the theatre society. He also pointed out that theatre in Delhi University has always been a tool of speaking up against what was felt unfair, and the medium of raising voices and taking a stand whenever words have been discouraged.

After deliberations between the society, the students’ union, and the college principal, with recommendations from the police authorities to ensure the safety of the students, the event was postponed to a later date to prevent escalation of chaos on campus. Members of the society were unavailable for comments.

Feature image: Kartik Kher for DU Beat

Saumya Kalia ([email protected]) and Akshara Srivastava ([email protected])

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S.G.T.B Khalsa College

Street play event postponed at SGTB Khalsa on police recommendation

By Shubham Kaushik February 23, 2017

Feature image: Kartik Kher for DU Beat

Saumya Kalia ([email protected]) and Akshara Srivastava ([email protected])

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DU Annual Fest Season

Urvashi Rautela and EDM night highlights of Day 2 of Reverie

By Shubham Kaushik February 16, 2017

With quality performances in varied events, informal and competitive, the second day at Reverie 2017, the annual cultural festival of Gargi College, was a day full of activity.

The Indian choir event, organised by Samranjini, the Indian music society of the college, was the first event of the day. Samranjini, the Indian music society of Gargi College, and Alahyaa, the Indian music society of Daulat Ram College, bagged the first position. The second position was shared by Dhwani, the Indian music society of Lady Shri Ram College for Women, and Alaap, the Indian music society of Sri Venkateswara College. The third position was bagged by the MuSoc of Kirori Mal College

The street play competition, Aabhaas, was held by Kshitij, the Hindi theater society of Gargi College, and was one of the most sought after events of the day. After a string of stirring performances on various social themes, Anubhuti, the dramatics society of Sri Venkateswara College was adjudged the winner. Et Cetera, the cultural society of Guru Tegh Bahadur Institute of Technology, for their performance called Coming Soon, centred around the forced opinions in modern times were given the second position. Natuve, the dramatics society of Shaheed Bhagat Singh College, were awarded the third position for their act about the child sexual abuse called Thora Dard Hi Sahi.

gopr1199_1487173333797_high — EDM night on Day 2 of Reverie with the Progressive Brothers

In the ad making competition held by Cinematrix, the film making society of the college, Anish Sagar from Deshbandhu College, Digvijay from Deshbandhu College, and Mallika from Indraprastha College for Women, rose above the rest to win the first, second and third positions respectively.
The next event was, Reverie Idol, the Hindi solo singing competition, where Ridhima from Miranda House and Ishita from Dyal Singh College (Morning) jointly emerged as the winners, while Vaibhav Sakshi from Miranda House and Sarat from Hansraj College jointly came second. Sukriti and Sourabh from SGTB Khalsa were give the third position.

Next up in the line was stage play completion, Nivacanna, hosted by Gargi College’s stage play society, Upstage. A total of six teams participated and they were judged by a panel of Narendra Bhutani, Shatrupa Sinha and Anusuya Aggarwal. Shunya theater society of Ramjas College secured first position for their production Evam Indrajit. Second position and the Best Production were awarded to The Players, the theatre society of Kirori Mal College, for the staging of Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time. Ibtida, the dramatics society of Hindu College, was awarded third position for their play There Stands Alone.

The highlight of the Reverie day 2 was actress and model Urvashi Rautela’s presence. An alumuna of Gargi College, Urvashi charmed the crowd with her inspiring speech. “Only way to do great work is to do what you love and you must find what you love. If you haven’t found what it is, then keep looking”, she said. She also remembered her college days when she was a part of Enliven, the western dance society and danced with the faculty and the union members on her popular hits.

The crowd danced to the EDM duo of Sunny Sharma and Karan Bhalla, known by their stage name, Progressive Brothers, a name populated after their debut at Sunburn and Supersonic, as the second day at Reverie 2017 drew to a close.

Images by Vegh Daswani and Gerush Bahal for DU Beat

Joyee Bhattacharya ([email protected]), Nikhil Kumar ([email protected]) and Niharika Dabral ([email protected])

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Uncategorized

In Conversation with Wannabe Anonymous, the stand-up comedy duo from DCAC

By Shubham Kaushik February 11, 2017

College is a great time to explore and discover one’s passions. The experiences, adventures, and occasional escapades enjoyed are perfect shapers and nurturers of one’s innate talent. While most are exposed to the opportunity of taking on something new, only a few actually have the dogged determination to pursue their interests and persist in only getting better along the way. Siddharth Singh and Prakhar Maheshwari from Wannabe Anonymous are perfect examples of how a passion identified and shared in college by two like-minded people can be transformed into a rewarding side-career:

Q: Let’s hear about you from you. Take us to the beginning.

Siddharth: Prakhar and I are from Delhi College of Arts and Commerce. We studied Economics, and met in our second year of college. We both had an interest in comedy. We used to follow and share videos of Kenny Sebastian and Vir Das. Inspired, we decided to actively venture into the niche comedy scene. Initially, we wanted to convey our comedy through the medium of nukkad natak, but then we decided on stand-up comedy instead.
Prakhar: Yes, because sense prevailed! (laughs) We figured that the latter form would be more apt, especially in the initial stage, because we weren’t very sure about our content. The reception and response to a stand-up gig is more encouraging as it helps you gauge the demands of the audience and learn what works and what doesn’t. We decided to combine our humour and thus, Wannabe Anonymous was born.

Q: You’ve put yourself in an extremely competitive field, which is only growing by the day. At any point in your journey till now did you find yourself questioning your instincts and giving up?

Siddharth: After conceiving ‘Wannabe Anonymous’, we applied to perform at Rendezvous 2015. The video we sent to them got rejected. But we didn’t let that bog us down. We performed our first show at a café in Hauz Khas Village.
Prakhar: Towards the beginning of our show, the crowd was thin. But after a while, the café started filling up. That really encouraged us. We were really happy with the way we performed that day.
Siddharth: But then when we had to upload the video of our show online, we realised that we were capable of much better. We had second thoughts and didn’t want to put the video up.
Prakhar: However, we decided to learn from our experience. That video made us want to do better and strive to achieve the level of comedy that we knew we could create. We faced some lows. We do so even now. Instead of letting that pull us down, we like to let that motivate us to do better.
Q- Tell us about your most successful and special show?

Siddharth- I remember Indraprastha College for Women as a fantastic show. We had prepared a script for 25 minutes and the show went on for 45 minutes. It was the kind of show we live for.

Prakhar- It was all impromptu. The audience was very engaged and responsive, it was the kind of connect that we always aspire for.

Siddharth- I think it had to do with something that I like to call induction. It’s like when the first five minutes of the show go well, then automatically the chances of the whole show going great goes up. That’s why before starting we try to the get the audience riled up and get their attention.

Q- How do you do that? Are there any tricks?

Siddharth- I do this stupid thing – and Prakhar hates me for this – where I just ask the assemblage to show us how to clap, how to whistle etc. Basically we just make them look at us, ensure their attentiveness, and get them energised. It works.

Prakhar- Once you have the audience hooked, your lamest jokes will work. I find this phenomenon worked with Kenny Sebastian often. Once during his gig, Kenny simply said that “I’m going to shave.” and the people went berserk. He just said “I’m going to shave”. It wasn’t a joke, but it was still funny. That’s the kind of charm we want to own.

Question- In recent times, we have seen that controversies and comedians have had many run ins. Kiku Sharda was booked under section 295 A of the Indian Penal Code (outraging religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious belief) and recently the Tanmay Bhatt and Lata Mangeshkar fiasco happened. What are your views on this? Do you think comedians should be more responsible?

Prakhar- I think people should just have a sense of humour. In case of Tanmay Bhatt and Lata Mangeshkar controversy, I find people to be unnecessarily touchy. Why it was even made into a big deal? It’s beyond me.

Q- But, do think this applies to the sexist jokes too? Someone might say that “yes, it’s sexist. If you don’t like it then ignore me.”

Siddharth- We personally do not crack sexist jokes. We make Punjabi jokes, we make jokes on colleges about certain DU colleges, and chances are someone will always be offended at something. We know we can’t always prevent that from happening. However, we know where to draw the line. It’s about one’s own discretion. About the ethical aspect of jokes, should they be offensive or not, I don’t know honestly. I haven’t formed an opinion on this.

Prakhar– Last year we performed at IIT Delhi. Some of our jokes were sexist in nature and they were being received very well by the crowd, which was was male dominated. There were two girls there and in the middle of the show they left. We don’t know if they left because they were offended or because they just wanted to leave for other reasons. Now when we think about IIT Delhi, it does make us uncomfortable. After that show we made a point not to crack such jokes, even if they are in demand.

Siddharth- Another time, during the show at Indraprastha College for Women, I made a joke on how women are bad drivers and the crowd started screaming “Offensive”, “Not funny” and “Sexist”. Thankfully, my senses prevailed quickly and I moulded it into something else. Anyway, we are not proud of these jokes of ours. That is something we realise now.

Q- Judging from this instance that you talked about, what do you do when a joke falls flat? No one laughs and it’s just gone.

Prakhar- See, the fact that it’s two of us to take the fall helps a-lot. Sometimes when we are fortunate, we improvise something on the spot and it works, sometimes we simply move ahead. Initially we used to explain our jokes expecting that the audience will laugh. We would assume that no one got it, instead of accepting that it was lame. This was a horrible thing to do. Now we know (chuckles)

Q- You guys have a regular job, so how sincerely are you guys thinking about stand-up comedy?

Siddharth- I know this lexicon is clichéd but I’ll use it anyway. We both belong to a typical middle class family, which means we have a fair share of duties and moral dilemma. Papa CJ is one of my favourite comedians and one thing he says is that financial independence is the best gift you can give to yourself and your parents. I agree with this 100%. I can’t allow myself to depend on my dad’s money because I’m aware of the responsibility I have towards my family. Stand-up comes with certain risks and I can’t afford those risks right now. However, that doesn’t mean I’ll use this as an excuse for not working on Wannabe Anonymous. I love Wannabe Anonymous.

Prakhar- A nine to five job that ensures that we get paid every month acts as a safety net that we need. It’s like what Biswapati Sarkar categorises as: area of interest and area of knowledge. Our jobs are our area of knowledge and Stand-up is our area of interest. Right now we are in our early 20s and we feel believe that we are able to balance job and passion very well.

Q- Recently you did your fist ticketed show which was a success. How do you see this transition from free shows to ticketed shows?

Prakhar- It was great! I can’t explain how awesome it felt to be on stage and to see that these many people have bothered to pay for us.

Siddharth- When I was preparing the script for the show my brother asked me, “How is it going?” and I casually replied, “It’s okay, let’s see.” To that, my brother said, “Listen, please be serious because people have paid for this. You must do justice to their money.” Some extra responsibility is always there when it’s a paid performance.

Prakhar- Though it’s not like we are not sincere otherwise. We are very serious comedians. (winks)

Q- If you were given a chance to relive your college lives, then which college would you choose, except Delhi College of Arts and Commerce?

Siddharth- Shri Ram College of Commerce

Prakhar- St. Stephens College.

Siddharth- But then who will be your friend? Stephenians won’t befriend you, right?

Prakhar- But dude, if you stay in the same collage from the starting then one or two nice people will be kind enough to be my friends.

Q- Last question: where do you see yourselves 5 years from now?

Siddharth- Ideally, I see myself doing stand-up full time.

Prakhar- When you start from the bottom it only goes up. Five years from now, I think we’ll still be doing stand-up.

Feature Image by Alex Arthur for DU Beat

Interview by Kriti Sharma ([email protected]) and Niharika Dabral ([email protected])

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Events

Economics accessible for all: Book launch and interactive session with Prof. Ashok Sanjay Guha

By Shubham Kaushik February 7, 2017

Economics, while all-pervasive and key to the functioning of all realms of society, is also often blamed to be dry and inaccessible for the general population who aren’t well-versed with the jargon that comes with the discipline. Prof. Ashok Sanjay Guha‘s latest release, Economics Without Tears: a New Approach to an Old Discipline, is an attempt to change that perception. Through his book, Prof. Guha, who is recognised as one of the most impressive contemporary Indian economists, attempts to not only introduce economic theory to students and the general reader, but to also show that economics can simultaneously be a learning experience and huge entertainment. The book has been received with much adulation by the who’s who of the world of economics, including Jagdish Bhagwati, Professor of Economics, Law and International Affairs at Columbia University, and Pranab Bardhan, Professor at the Department of Economics at University of California, Berkeley.

The book is set to be launched by Prof. Yogesh Kumar Tyagi, the Vice – Chancellor of the University of Delhi, in the presence of the author, on February 13, 2017, in an event that is being organised by the Department of Economics of Miranda House, in collaboration with Penguin Random House, India. The launch will be followed by an interactive session with Professor Guha and Dr. Parikshit Ghosh, who is an Associate Professor with the Delhi School of Economics.

The event is open for all students and teachers of and beyond the University of Delhi.

Date: February 13, 2017

Venue: Seminar Hall, Miranda House

Timings: 10:30 a.m.

(Students must carry their ID cards for entry)

With inputs from the Department of Economics, Miranda House

Shubham Kaushik

[email protected]

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Features

Perceptions: A Medical Musing

By Shubham Kaushik February 1, 2017

With due apologies to Charles Dickens, the time has come to tell a A Tale of Two Stereotypes of Students-Medicos and Non Medicos, or a Maulanian and an ideal Delhi University student. The opening of the Tale of Two Cities sounds eerily contemporaneous: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times- it was the age of masti and friendship, it was the age of seriousness and studies, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of dillagi, it was the season of exams; it was the spring of fun, it was the winter of tutorials..”

Although they are a part of one of the most coveted and happening universities of the county, that is, Delhi University, medical colleges like Maulana Azad Medical College have always been treated as a hub of bespectacled Homo Medicus. We have often been looked upon as boring nerds. Maybe the dreadful sizes of our books and our never ending medical talks, which are not even comprehensible to our non-medical friends, justifies it to a point. But don’t judge this book by its cover.
The intricacies of a life of a medico can’t be described in words – one second you are cutting open the chest of a person, and their relatives thank you for saving their life, and in another second you are partying hard with your friends at the most happening location in the city. The transition isn’t as smooth as it seems.When bones break, organs burst and flesh tears, we can sew the flesh, repair the damage and ease the pain. But when life breaks down, there are no hard and fast rules. We just have to feel our way through.

Often branded as extraordinary amalgamations of grey matter, Maulanians are not the same as they were when they first entered the college.This place has a charm which leads to the evolution of everyone in its premises. Welcome to the first hand experiences of medicos – where through the years, we not only grow as humans, but also into distinct entities.

The first day of transition of a student into a ‘med student’ is marked by putting on a white coat and taking selfies with it. 1st year is all about getting to know a human being- not philosophically, but biologically. Mind you again, it is not introspection, it is dissection! This is the period where the seed of passion for truly learning medicine is sown. 2nd of MBBS is a crucial time, wherein you start becoming a budding doctor. It is real patients with real diseases and real drugs to give them. It is the addition of the stethoscope to your attire. This is the time where something as little as a running nose or headache can make you think of all the possible causes and complications of the same. You leave nothing from consideration – seasonal viral or tuberculosis or even cancer! You are your own first patient. Even the first lubb-dubb heard on the stethoscope is first your own, and a normal heartbeat gradually becomes the favourite melody of a physician. The last two years are countless hours spent taking histories of our patients – running our brain endlessly to figure out what went wrong, and more importanly, ways to make it right. This is when we start forming long-term goals and considering post graduation and practice. It is also the time where we realise that doctors plays a much greater role in the society than just healing. It is realising that huge responsibilities rest upon our shoulders. Doesn’t sound fun, right?

However, this is a profession where our decisions directly impact someone’s quality of life, and sometimes even their existence. We may seem dangerously over-educated but there is another facet to our personality, a perception which is generally hidden and that only a few can look into. Just like a coin has 2 sides, so does our life. For it’s not all work and no play, and there’s a pretty good reason why we guys are a part of DU! The adrenaline rush of walking into a medical college was not all in vain. Yes, the endless torrent of exams does confine to the library for long hours, but that doesn’t keep us from partying once it’s over. The hours of our ‘formalin laden’ dissection hall prove to be the foundation of the strongest relationships (believe it or not!) You may get high by those round the clock booze parties, but for us, just an acquaintance asking for some medical advice seems to suffice. We may be cut off from the rest of DU, but our celebrations engender envy even in the wildest of parties. Agreed, we have to read fat books, undergo ward rotations, are caught up in serious attendance issues, and above all, try to pass our exams with a legible handwriting. Finding time for non medico friends is a challenge itself. But we are courageous enough to follow our dreams into the storms they takes us to.

We still paint when we come back from classes, watch all the latest TV series and movies.We watch House MD with the same interest as we watch Suits.We can talk about the episode of F.R.I.E.N.D.S in just a timespan of 2 mins after it begins. We groove to Honey Singh’s and Badshah’s latest tracks, BYD is among our favourite hangouts, we do flock Mystery Rooms, and indulge in late night parties and night outs. We even sneak out of the lectures through a proxy and also have the gossip mongers who keep on entertaining us with the latest updates around the campus.

True, a stethoscope around the neck and the trust of a patient entail a humongous responsibility on our shoulders. But, as we live up to that, we work hard and party harder. We leave no inch of Delhi unvisited, no pubs untouched and at the same time, no tasks unattended. For life doesn’t always give you a second chance. Being a medical student involves working hard, but just like our counterparts of DU, it is nothing short of a roller-coaster. There are plenty of off-putting myths about being a medical student, but in reality it’s enjoyable and highly rewarding, especially in light of what we are working towards. Often people cannot think of a single reason why we should follow such a struggle, but they can think of a thousand reasons why we should quit. The thing is, things are made harder for us on purpose. There are lives in our hands. There comes a moment when it’s more than just a game, and you either take that step forward or turn around and walk away. We could quit, but here’s the thing- we love the playing field.

Proud to be a Maulanian!

Featured Image: bostinno.streetwise.co

Guest Post by the students of Maulana Azad Medical College

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