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Confluence 2014

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Pixels, the photography society of Hans Raj College organized their annual photography fest titled ‘Plickture’ on 2nd-4th March along with Confluence, the annual cultural fest of the college. The fest featured competitions that were conducted online as well as those held on-the-spot. By having a separate event for photography societies to participate as a team, it also brought team work into the foray of activities.

Here is a look at who won what during the fest:

Online Events

As part of the pre-event promotions, an online photography competition was organized where the participants had to send in pictures clicked by them on the themes, “Life as you see it” and “What if?”

Results were as follows:

first prize for life as you see it
Winning Entry for ‘Life as you see it’

Theme: Life as you see it
1st Prize – Subhradeep Saha, Zakir Hussain College
Caption – A summer bath

first prize what if_
Winning entry for ‘What If?’

Theme: What If?
1st Prize – Arushi Aggarwal, Miranda House
Caption – What if past could come to life

Winners were awarded a manfrotto jacket and a tripod.

Photo Exhibition

For the campus festival the society had organized the photo exhibition which was more of the main attractions for the Day 1 of college annual festival. 100 photos clicked by the members of the societies were displayed with appropriate captions. The visitors had an option to comment on any photo (using sticky notes) or write their reviews in AMBIGRAM Pixels – Remark Book. The look up flex at the exhibition was also appreciated by the visitors. Prithvi Kakkar, the president of Pixels said, “Teachers and students in their feedback mentioned that ‘aaj tak Hans Raj mein aisa kabhi nahi hua’, I need not say anything else.”

On-the-spot

For the campus rounds an on-the-spot competition was organized separate for DSLR and mobile users. The participants had to click the photographs inside the Hans Raj campus using a camera or mobile phone and submit it with appropriate captions.

Theme: Irony (DSLR users)

First prize for ‘Irony’

1st Prize – Taranveer Singh, Guru Gobind Singh College of Commerce
Caption – Isn’t it just ironical when you can’t capture irony in a competition themed Irony

Second prize irony
Second prize winning entry for ‘Irony’

2nd Prize – Arushi Aggarwal, Miranda House
Caption – A Glance.

Theme: Campus Cheer (Mobile Users)

First prize campus cheer
First Prize for ‘Campus Cheer’

1st Prize – Swarna Garg, Shivaji College
Caption – Express it out now because ‘kal rahein ya na rahein hum’

second prize campus cheer
Second prize for ‘Campus Cheer’

2nd Prize – Rahul Vaid, Hansraj College
Caption – Who Said Only Birds Can Fly

Winners for the first spot for both the themes were awarded Rs. 1500 each and the first runner-ups were given Rs. 1000 each.

Battle of Societies

The main highlight event of Plickture was Battle of Societies, for which eight photography societies from various colleges participated. Battle of Societies was divided into five events one of which was an online event. Other 4 events were CAP-IT where participants had to caption 5 photos clicked by members of Pixels; PHOT-ON – an on the spot competition where one member from the team had to click the photographs within the campus on the theme “artsy philosophy”; QUIZ THE CAM – the photography quiz and PHOTO MORPHING – making a photo collage.

The results for the individual events were as follows:
Online Event – Lady Shri Ram College for Women and Kirori Mal College
Phot-on – Guru Gobind Singh College of Commerce
Quiz the cam – Lady Shri Ram College for Women
Cap-it – Lady Shri Ram College for Women
Photo Morphing – Lady Shri Ram College for Women

Hence, after compiling the results, Lady Shri Ram College’s film and photography society Projekt was declared the Best Photography Society. They were awarded a trophy and a cash prize of Rs. 10,000. Commenting on their victory, Koyna, one of the coordinators of Projekt says, “Battle of socities was a very unique event because till now we have only had individual competitions. There has never been any event where you have a society as a whole competing against other socities. It’s indeed overwhelming to be able to stand ground at such a event. Hopefully, this will make Projekt and the photography team more visible within the college as well.”

Mr. Pradeep Kumar, a wildlife photographer and an ex-professor at Hans Raj College judged all the events.

The third and concluding day of Confluence, the annual fest of Hans Raj College was lined up with events like Mock Stock, Street dance, Ad-Mad, Western Dance, Choreography and Battle of Bands While for some events like Western Dance, students thronged the venue, others witnessed comparatively less audience.

team kmc
Kirori Mal College’s Choreography Society

Western Dance and Choreography were the highlights of the day. Both the events saw some exceptional performances by students that were highly applauded by the spectators. Choreography started around 10:30 AM and went on for two hours. Around 10 colleges participated in this event. Lady Shri Ram College bagged the first prize and the second prize went to Kamala Nehru College’s Choreography Society – Adagio.

After Choreography, the Western Dance competition began at 1 PM with participation from around fifteen colleges. IIT Delhi boys, who gave a dynamic performance, took away the first prize in the event. The auditorium reverberated with cheers and claps while they danced. The second prize was shared by Guru Gobind Singh College and Sri Venkateswara College’s Verve whose dance performances was quite energetic as well. The third prize went to Jesus and Mary College’s Western Dance Society – Mudra.

Roquefort or Battle of Bands saw Conundrum, an alternative rock band from PGDAV, emerge as winners while the band – L For Vendetta – secured the second position. The Best Vocalist was Shiv Hastwala from Conundrum, the Best Bassist, Keyboarist and Drummer were all from L for Vendetta and the Best Guitarist was from the band Andolan.

Featured image: Hans Raj College’s Choreography Society

Image credit: Iresh Gupta for DU Beat

The last day of Hans Raj’s Confluence not only had competitive events lined up, but also a closing act by Bohemia, the international rapper (a.k.a. Rap da Badshah). The performance that was scheduled to begin at 2 p.m. finally started at 3.

bohemia1

Bohemia started by his famous song Sahara which was interrupted by a technical breakdown due to overcrowding of a few youngsters near the technical setup. He also rapped few of his famous songs like Kali Denali and Ek Tera Pyar.

In between the tracks, he also had long interactions with the audience. Talking of San Francisco, his life and the initial struggle with the English language, he went on to Bollywood numbers such as Chandni Chowk to China. 

Due to a sunny afternoon, few people were seen standing out of the performance ground on a shady height for the star to be visible. He mentioned that he has come all over from California just to perform in Hansraj College. His interactions were all in Punjabi, which he said is his mother tongue. On stage while addressing the crowd he said, “I am a Punjabi artist. I don’t like when people call me just a rapper. I am a singer who writes and sings only in Punjabi. I do not need the tag of an international performer”

By Aishwarya Chaurasia and Iresh Gupta

Image Credit: Chirag Sharma

The second day at Hans Raj’s Confluence was a musical one with both the Indian and Western music choir lined up on the same day. In addition, Eclat – the dramatics society’s fest also came to a close with Jesus and Mary College winning the street play competition. The day also had a couple of informal events such as Paper Dance and Pictionary to engage with the students.

The day witnessed Rachnotsav – the music festival with its Indian Choir Competition – Pehel. Pandit Sarathi Chaterjee presided over as the judge. The competition had various teams battling for the top positions. Sangeetika, the music society of Kamala Nehru College was adjudged the best performance. Team from Daulat Ram College, Alhaiya bagged the second position in Indian Choir.

Western Choir Competition – Choirs had enthralling musical performances when set audience to the applauding mode throughout the performances. Mr. Nilotpal Sinha and Ms. Grace honoured the event as judges. Kirori Mal College’s Musoc was chosen the best team. Sri Venkateswara College’s Crescendo and Lady Shri Ram College for Women’s Western Music Society shared the place for the first runners-up. Cash prizes worth Rs. 8000/- were given out on Day 2 of Rachnotsav.

Other two exciting competitions were going alongside. Sports Quiz and IPL bidding had 20 and 35 participating teams respectively. Prelims for the sports quiz shortlisted top 6 teams which sat for the quiz finals. Bala Subramanium from Hansraj College and Gukul from Atma Ram Sanatan Dharma (ARSD) bagged the first position and won the cash prize of Rs. 3000/-. Second prize for cash amount of Rs. 2000/- was won by Prateek Panda from Department of Mathematics at Delhi University and Borio from Hansraj. IPL bidding, the mock bidding session saw top 8 teams in finals after a quiz round in the prelims. Contestants in groups of 2 were allotted IPL teams and each team had to buy players with maximum ratings with the budget of 80 crore per team. Sahil Ramchandani and Karuna Singh, both from the host college won the bidding competition and took away Rs. 6500/- in cash and kind.

Art related competitions like Poster Making and Rangoli Making were held. Theme “Freedom” was decided for poster making and Rangoli making saw rangoli designs on nation, diversity and religion to name a few. Chahat Bansal and Swati Sharma from Keshav Mahavidyalaya won the rangoli competition for their Bollywood inspired rangoli. The contestants apart from designing it, had to explain their idea in front of the judges.

Along with formal competitive events, several informal events such as Paper dance and Pictionary were also a part of Confluence. Swati and Neha from Hansraj won the Paper dance competition with a cash prize of Rs. 1000/- and coupons and vouchers worth the same amount. 20-25 teams participated in Scavenger Hunt where participants had to solve maximum clues in one hour time. Khushboo and Shivani from Hansraj won the competition with prize worth of Rs. 3000/-, both in cash and kind.

paper dance-1
Paper Dance

Other filler and fun events were organised for the festival visitors as well like Pictionary which was held in 3 rounds and teams had to solve maximum clues in the least time. Bollywood Tambola required the partners to be well aware about full names of all the bollywood actors and the event was held in various slots where small prizes were given out but participants had a lot of fun.

An evening of music and dance

dhruv
Dhruv Vishwanath takes the stage.

The performance stage was all set in the morning with police security in the area for the DJ evening. Before the DJ’s arrival, Dhruv Vishwanath, a famous performer in the DU circuit sang some romantic numbers. He had also opened for Junkyard Groove, recently at Venky’s Nexus.

dj

 

In the evening, Confluence attracted a good crowd when the DJs took on to the floor. DJ BLING and DJ Vij were an hour late. Everyone moved on the famous dance numbers played by the DJ duo. Manav Malhotra, a DU student said, “The DJ is decent but the crowd is not. We expect Bohemia’s star night on the last day brings great crowd.”

Eclat – the annual theatre festival by the Hansraj Dramatics Society on Day 2 had remaining stage performances for Rangmanchiyata (the stage play competition). Judges for Day 1, Mr. Sanjeev Saluja and Mr. Pranay Manchanda judged the event for this day as well. Shri Ram College of Commerce performed their annual production Black Comedy. The results were scheduled to be disclosed later in the day along with the street results. But according to the judges all teams were equally good, so it was decided to celebrate Rangmanchiyata just as a festival and not a competition. Rs. 2500/- was declared to be given to each team as a token of appreciation.

dtu performing kya dilli kya lahore
DTU performing Kya Dilli, Kya Lahore.

Best actors were adjudged for the stage play competition. Best Actor(Female) was bagged by Vidushi Chadda from SRCC for Black Comedy and Best Actor(Male) was also given from the same production to Kabir Sethi. Both the actors were awarded 100% scholarship for a theatre training programme by Actor Factor Theatre Company worth Rs. 23500/- each. The second position for best actor was won by Arpit Sharma from Delhi Technical University for Kya Dilli, Kya Lahore! Arpit was awarded with 25% scholarship for the same theatre training programme.

Day 2 of Eclat also witnessed the street play competition – “Bolbala Badlav Ka” with the theme “Legacy of Campus theatre.” For the same purpose, the performance area for street theatre was set up in a way that each performing team had a separate booth where the picture gallery of each team for the past 5 years was displayed. Other participants and viewers had an option to provide their feedback for the teams and well at these personalized team booths.

Mr. Vineet Trikha and Mr. Siddharth Singh came over as judges for Bolbola, who are both experienced theatre activists for Pandies Theatre Group. Mr. Singh – an ex president of Hansraj dramatics society and a graduate from Hansraj and presently organizes theatre training for youngsters inside and outside Delhi. Mr. Trikha with almost 15 years of experience has performed many plays in India and abroad.

eclat - sana. best actress street
Sana – Winner of the Best Actress

A total of nine teams performed for Bolbala on social topics like premature puberty, rapes in India which come with no action thereafter, women rights and politics.

Siddharth Singh said, “Teams should be very careful while choosing the themes for street plays. Street theatre is a risky form of dramatic art. A social issue which may appeal to you, may not work with the audience.”

Team from Jesus and Mary College, Kehkasha stole the show at Bolbala. They bagged the prize of best team and best music for their production “Gunah Hai, Par Saza Nahi” and won the cash prize of Rs. 5000/- and Rs. 1000/- respectively. First runners-up position was shared by Guru Gobind Singh College of Commerce (GGSCC) and Indraprastha College for Women SRand they were awarded Rs. 3000/- in total. Taking home the title of second runner up team and Rs. 1500/- cash was S.G.T.B Khalsa College for “We, The People”

Best actors were bagged by Sana from Jesus and Mary College and Akhil Sachdeva of GGSCC for their respective productions. They both were awarded the 25% TIP 16 PLUS scholarships by Actor Factor Theatre company.

Confluence – the annual cultural festival of Hans Raj College was set open on 2nd March 2014 by the Principal of the college, Mr. V.K Khwatra. The event started with a brief introduction about the festival and how in the past Confluence has been able to receive tremendous appreciation. Mr. VK Khwatra along with other dignitaries and guests, Mr Bijendra Singh (Hostel Warden) and Mrs. Sonal Gupta (ECA Convener) lighted the holy lamp. Mr. Mohit Saini, the newly elected President of Hans Raj College also joined the lamp lighting ceremony.

Saptak Chattopadhyay, member of Swaranjali (Music Society of the college) created an aura in the auditorium by singing the Durga Stuti and Guru Vandana. The Principal then addressed the students and said, “Extra Curricular Activities are the most important part for both interpersonal and intra-personal development. Confluence, I hope, will bring a lot of learning and experience to each one of you in this regard.” He wished luck to all the participants and organizers and declared Confluence 2014 open!

The festival, later in day, witnessed various cultural competitions being organized by different societies of Hans Raj College. Rachnotsav – the Music Festival by Swaranjali, the Music Society of the college, was a tribute and homage to Late. Rachna Sharma, ECA convenor of college who passed away last year. She was a mentor to many students and inspired each member of the society to do his or her best. The Music Festival that would go on for all three days had two solo competitions on the first day.

Mr. Nilotpal Sinha, Director of House of Symphony and Ms. Grace, a well-known vocalist judged the competition. Indian Solo competition witnessed healthy spirit between the participants and the Western solo competition attracted 16 singers from all over the circuit. In the Indian (Solo) Singing event, the 1st prize was won by Digvijay Singh from Kirori Mal College in the Semi Classical category and the 1st prize in the Classical category went to Bineet Singh from Music Faculty. The Western (Solo) Singing event saw Fiona Lalmalsawmi from Miranda House being awarded the first position while Hanita Bhambri from Shaheed Sukhdev College of Business Studies bagged the second position.

In their feedback, the judges mentioned that the contestants should focus on the song selection. They pointed that there were two ways to go about this – one is to choose a complex song and perform it in the simplest way and the other is to choose a simple song and perform it in a complex manner to impress the judges.

decoration

Alongside, Pixels, the Photography Society of the college was organizing photography competition called Plickture. The event had a photography exhibition put up in the college with the 100 photographs clicked by the members of society. The visitors had an option to paste their comment there. Also, “Photon on the Spot” was organised with theme – Irony – separately for DSLR and mobile phone users. Battle of Events will also be organized by the society where different photography societies from various colleges will be battling over 5 events in 2 days to win the TITLE OF SOCIETIES, a trophy and Rs. 10000  cash prize. Pithvi Kakkar, President of Pixels told DU Beat that results of all the events of Plickture will be declared on Day 2 of the fest.

In addition, four stage theatre performances were held as part of the college’s annual dramatics fest – Eclat.

Rangmanchiyata (The Stage Play Competition) with the theme “Tribute to Campus Theatre” was held on Day 1 as part of Eclat – The theatre festival organised by the Hans Raj Dramatics Society. The competition commenced in Auditorium right after the inaugural ceremony. Judges for the event were Mr. Sanjeev Saluja, experienced theatre actor and director and also the member of Board of National Committee of Satya Sai Organisation and Mr. Pranay Manchanda, a young graduate from London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art and an actor and director with experience of 16 years.

the private ear by ramjas
The Private Ear by Ramjas College

6 top teams from the theatre circuit were selected for the main event after the screening process. Day 1 of Rangmanchiyata has 4 teams presenting their productions. The other 2 teams will be performing on Day 2 and results will be declared on Day 2 of Eclat along with the street play results, also scheduled to be held on the second day. The productions presented were Mamtaz Bhai Patang Waale by Dyal Singh College, The Private Ear by Ramjas College, Batch 2002 by Hindu college and Delhi Technical University performed Kya Dilli, Kya Lahore!

The auditorium was jampacked for all 4 performances and they ended with an individual team feedback from both the judges. Mr. Manchanda said, “I look at plays not as judge but as someone from audience who may have paid 500 bucks to watch the play. Today I saw amazing performances from the campus circuit but teams need to focus more on story and one should understand the character well before portraying it up on the stage”