Jashn 9.0: Celebrating Traditions, Togetherness, and Life

“The more you celebrate life, the more there is in life to celebrate.” — Oprah Winfrey, American media executive, actress, talk show host, television producer, and philanthropist

IIT Gandhinagar is an active promoter of celebrating the culture and tradition of India among its students. With a vision to encourage inter-batch interaction and increase the participation of students in cultural events, the Institute started a fun-filled get-together known as Jashn in the year 2011. A word of Persian origin, Jashn, signifies celebrations, and festivities.

Since its initiation, the surprise bucket of this intra-institute cultural festival contains many interesting, innovative, and exciting yet traditional series of events and games each year. It also comprises of sessions such as art exhibitions, photography and movie-making competitions, quizzes, drama, dance, and musical performances by the student community!

The ninth edition of this gala, Jashn 9.0, will be held from 9th to12th January 2020. The entire IITGN family is gearing up to celebrate this immensely popular college cultural extravaganza. With the most friendly and fascinating features of the Indian culture beautifully blended into an intricate mix of the traditional festivities and contemporary fun, merry, and party spirit, this season of Jashn is something to look forward to eagerly. It offers excitement, entertainment, and a lot more to explore. As the latest teaser video rightly says, “the most energizing days are back!”

Here is a glimpse of some of the activities that would be the center of attraction during this year’s four-day celebration. You may ask, how do these games and tasks encourage inter-batch intercommunications? Simple, by following the most fundamental rule — participate in mixed teams with other Bachelors, Masters, and Ph.D. students!

Minefield

An exciting game with three members in each team, the teams will play simultaneously. One of the players will be blindfolded, and the other two will assist them in walking from the start point to the endpoint. The arena will be full of obstacles, and the navigator has to avoid those. The minimum obstacles you touch, the more points you get! There will be a time limit of five minutes, and the team with more points at the end wins.

Live Angry Birds

Two teams will compete against each other in this game. One of them will send two members to arrange the blocks, and the other will have to send three members to shoot the blocks arranged by the first team. Teams will earn points, while shooting, for every block that falls from the table. The level of difficulty will rise gradually.

Screw ‘Em

Five-member teams will play this game. It will comprise of four compulsory rounds and an extra one in case of a tie. Each round will be from a different genre, viz., balance, aim, teamwork, and speed. The toss at the start will decide which team will choose the genre for the first game, after which they will be selected by the teams alternatively. The team which loses the toss will pick up a random card, which will decide the number of points of that round. Finally, the bonus round will decide the winner.

Drishyam

Stand-up Comedy: A renowned comic style where the participant performs before a live audience, it is the most flexible form of comedy writing. Only single participation is allowed, and the time limit for the act will be 10–15 minutes.

Mono Acting: Played by a single participant, commonly portraying one character, it is a brilliant opportunity for artistic exploration. The time limit per act will be 10–15 minutes.

Speak Up

Get ready for the power-packed debates! There will be two teams (a mix of students and faculty), one supporting the motion and the other opposing it. The group debating in favour of the topic will be the Proposition, and the other one will be the Opposition. Each team will have four speakers to present their views and counter-arguments.

Nerf It Up

Two teams, with four players each, will start from opposite ends. Each player will possess one flag and one Nerf gun with five bullets. Both sides require to put their flag in a given specific area and return to their arena in the fixed time. The team with maximum points will win and will qualify for the next round. There will be a set time of 7 minutes in the first stage, which will decrease in further rounds. Players getting hit by Nerf gun bullets will be out of the task.

Frame by Frame

Each team will have up to five members. The duration of the recorded film should be four to six minutes. The movie can contain photographs, videos, music, and text. A panel of judges will scrutinize the entries based on parameters such as the storyline, videography, and editing, to name a few.

Lounge Snooker

It will be a doubles event, meaning, students will participate in pairs. A player will hit any ball using the white ball (the cue ball) with the help of a stick (the cue stick). They will first target the red ball using the cue ball and pot it (in the pot-hole) in one of the pots. After potting the red ball, the same player will target another ball apart from red. This ball will go back to its original position on the table after potting, but the red ball will not be put back on the table. If a player cannot pot the red or other balls in one turn, the chance will pass on to the opponent team.

Labyrinth

Based on the classic Pirates of the Carribean quest and treasure hunt games, but with some modifications. The participating groups (with five members each) will decipher the clues and reach the appropriate checkpoint. These spots spread all over the campus and even outside near-by places. The team that reaches the final position in the shortest amount of time will be the winner. The path for the navigation of each team will be unique.

Picture Perfect

This activity tests your knowledge of the film world entertainingly. How much do you know about Bollywood and Hollywood? There will be three rounds. The first will be a questionnaire containing anything related to Hollywood/Bollywood, viz., dialogues, songs, posters, plot, actors, awards, and so on. The second one will be a dumb charades round where one member from each team will enact the movie or TV show’s title given to them within a time limit. The third round will be a Pictionary round. From each side, one member will use drawings to explain the movie within a definite time.

Phew! The list is still not over. Lounge Carrom, Decibel (solo/duet instrumental/singing and band competition), the Jack of All Trades, Lounge Poker, Slammer (balling, boxing, FIFA, volleyball, and WWE), Live Snake and Ladder, LAN Gaming, Thump (solo and street battle dance), Supply Chess, Foock Quiz (sports questionnaire) — you name it, and Jashn’20 has it. Even some of the activities revolve around delicious dishes!

For the entire IIT Gandhinagar community, these four days will be brimming with enthusiasm, laughter, merriment, enjoyment, and yummy food.