Pulse, the annual Cultural fest of All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) which closed on 22nd September, faced immense backlash for mismanagement, chaos, and alleged forgery of results in the fashion show event.

The 19th edition of Pulse, the annual Cultural fest of All India Institution of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), took place from 16th to 22nd  September. This coveted event soon turned into a chaos when many of their events were delayed by an hour or more. The management is also being accused of forgery in results of the fashion competition, Panache.

An anonymous source from Shaheed Sukhdev College of Business Studies (SSCBS), told DU Beat, “The entire event was chaotic. We had solo performances, after the event began they told us then that they don’t have instruments set up, which is necessary for performances. So many colleges like Jesus and Mary College and us, helped them set up. Also, the process of sorting of slots wasn’t done right. And the students there weren’t supportive of the participants.” He also said that after a delay of one hour, the first-year members of Dhwani, SSCBS’s Western Music Society, went up on the stage and people in the back were yelling and unnecessarily shouting which made the entire process for the first-years very traumatic. “We literally had to stop the performance to make them (the crowd) silent and then continue. We had to encourage them (our juniors) and tell them that crowd of other places is genuinely better,” He added.

Arjun Jaiswal, Member of Dhwani, said “Being on stage, there were many lights and hence we couldn’t identify who and from where the people were shouting. And the only action taken against them was there were told by the anchor to leave the auditorium or stay quiet.”

The mismanagement did not just restrict itself to the Western Music event, but to the Fashion event as well.  Since past three years, AIIMS has been accused of forging results and favour certain teams. This year the fashion societies of various colleges witnessed the same in Panache, the Fashion Show.

Anshika Jain, President of IVouge, the fashion society of Sri Guru Gobind Singh College, said, “They promised us that results wouldn’t be forged like the previous years. They made us believe that it won’t happen. But we get to know that the results were rigged and the judges were switched last minute which was after 1 a.m. It was a waste of time and energy for all the teams who performed. We were given 3rd position, but they didn’t provide us with the mark sheet when asked. Later on when got the picture of mark sheet after arguing for about an hour the results were different from those announced. One of the judges, Ankit Gera agreed that the judgement was biased and that the teams faced injustice.”

She also added, “A few teams practiced on the main stage for 20-30 minutes whereas the other teams weren’t allowed to do the same.”  The fashion society event was delayed for four hours. Many societies, who were promised two rooms for themselves and heavy props, were given only one small room. Other than this, many teams were not even informed of their slot right until they came to the stage which gave them no time to prepare.

In protest of what happened, many fashion societies have come together and stand in solidarity against this. They might boycott AIIMS next year onwards. Many societies have resorted to Instagram to share their experience of this day with numerous posts to prevent anything like this in future.

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IVogue kickstarted its session 2019-2020 by securing 3rd position at Pulse – The Annual Fashion event at AIIMS @pulse.aiims, but just like the previous years, the sequence of events of mismanagement were no different. Not only the judging panel was changed at the very last moment, but the scorecards were also tampered with by the organizers of the event. In the era of nepotism, the scores of the favoured teams were spiked at the last moment. The scorecards evidently reflect the results that were intended to be declared by the judges. The scores were changed right before declaring the results and the judges candidly admitted the same. Also, the scorecards were not made transparent initially, being the participants. Every team puts in a hefty amount of hard work into these performances and deserve a fair judgement procedure. We stand united against the biasness and appeal every other team to do the same.

A post shared by I VOGUE (@ivogue.sggscc) on Sep 19, 2019 at 5:02am PDT

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@pulse.aiims has always been counted as one of the most awaited competitions of the season and seeing such mismanagement was highly disappointing. And we got to know that the result was rigged and the judging panel was switched at the last minute (and this is the 3rd time the same thing happened). After the results were told onstage, we went to the judges asking for feedback along with other college teams but instead of constructive criticism, the judging panel went berserk and shouted in a very unethical manner. Moreover, the event got delayed and all the teams were forced to wait for a long span of 4 hours. The result sheets were shown after an hour of arguing where in we had scored the highest in some sheets (being 7th slot, IHE) despite which not even the third position was given to us! This is the first time one of the judge among all of the judges agreed to the statement of the teams that it was biased ( And the judge was @ankitgera001 who agreed that it was biased). We need to put a stop to this and all the societies must raise their voices against this incident. @ivogue.sggscc @glitzfashionsociety @galorefashionsoc @bizarre_thefashionsociety @mlncbellissimo

A post shared by P O I S E (@poise_ihe) on Sep 18, 2019 at 5:24am PDT

A fashion society member, on the condition of anonymity said, “Bringing our problems to the head coordinator, I also want quote the words of what they said in response- ‘yehi hoga, itna hai toh mat aana agli baar.’ (This will continue to happen, if you are so displeased then don’t come again.)”

 Feature Image Credits: DU Beat Archives

Chhavi Bahmba

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