Critique — General Secretary Social and Cultural 2019–20
Disclaimer: The content below is the work of The Scholars’ Avenue as a team and is wholly our opinion as of the campus media body on a campus issue. Voters are encouraged to go through this and then make up their mind. We do not promote any one candidate over the other and have tried to stay as unbiased as possible in critiquing their proposals.
Candidate 1: Soumya Patel
Proposal 1: Initiation of live Streaming of all GC events which will aim to increase participation and transparency in GC events.
Need:
Despite the reduced hassle, someone that is very interested in watching the performances would just go right ahead and attend the event live. While the participants may stand to benefit from this, the number of people interested in the streams is questionable.
Feasibility:
Procuring the necessary equipment for the live stream is not a difficult task and events like graduation ceremony have been live streamed before. Although, it must be ensured that the events are streamed equally smooth given how sensitive the community is about the reputation of the hall.
Impact:
This might get more people interested in the events and even provide a hassle-free way for many people to watch the performances put forward by the participants, it is very difficult to see how the stream might gain a decent viewer base.
Proposal 2: Introduction of monologue and standup comedy in Open IIT.
Need:
There is a dire need for encouragement of standup comedy in the institute given how the institute’s performance at the Inter IIT cultural meet left a lot to be desired. Monologue would also provide a good platform for people to show their literary skills as there are no events that cater to these needs right now.
Feasibility:
An open mic event was conducted in November 2017 which saw decent participation. But other attempts have not been made owing to various difficulties. Having said that, the introduction of the event in the Open IIT should not be very difficult.
Impact:
While it may be relatively easy to implement this proposal, it remains to be seen how interested the community would be in the said events.
Proposal 3: Introduction of a Social and Cultural Newsletter.
Need:
There is a general lack of awareness about the cultural events happening in the institute, especially among the first years. Thus, the candidate is right in recognizing the need to address this issue.
Feasibility:
Creating and publishing a newsletter is relatively not effort intensive provided there is enough content to put out.
Impact:
It may be agreed that there is indeed need to address the lack of awareness among the community, a newsletter is definitely not the best way to go about tackling the problem. For instance, a newsletter named Sankalp was released by the gymkhana which reported events happening in the sports scenario. Not many people know about it and hence it is very difficult to see how this SoCult newsletter will leave a significant impact.
Candidate 2: Ayushi Thakur
Proposal 1: To introduce training seminars and workshops for students before and after selections for inter-IIT Cultural meet.
Need:
“Open to all” workshops are greatly required to increase participation from all members of the student community in Inter IIT cultural contingent rather than confining participation to selected members of the societies of respective genres. Workshops taken by professionals are also necessary to further improve the skills of Inter IIT cultural contingent so that they can perform better.
Feasibility:
There doesn’t seem to be enough groundwork done on how to sanction the budget for the proposal.
TSA commends the candidate’s efforts to copy a proposal from 2017–18 Gsec Socult Vaibhav Dusad and advises her to learn from his failures.
It was mentioned in your proposal that there will be workshops and training sessions for people wanting to take part in the Inter IIT Social and Cultural Meet but nothing of that sort happened. What is your opinion on this?
This point was mentioned in my budget when the proposal was drafted. But when I approached the institute administration for the same, they denied sanctioning the budget for this.
Do you consider this a fault on part of the administration?
Obviously. When I prepared the budget of 8 lacs and they sanctioned only 2 lacs without even taking my opinion into consideration, then I believe it is the administration which is to be blamed.Although eventually I was sanctioned the entire budget of 8 lacs, but this happened on 13th of December 2017, which was too late for organising any workshops since there was hardly any time left for Inter IIT.
(excerpt from Dusad’s term review by TSA)
TSA wishes the candidate all the best in her endeavour to bring this proposal to fruition and advises her to not take a leaf from Dusad’s book again.
Impact: If implemented, the proposal can go a long way to improve KGP’s performance in Inter IIT Cultural Meet. However, TSA hopes the candidate doesn’t copy Dusad’s implementation procedure too and end up not executing the said proposal.
Proposal 2: To introduce online booking of auditorium and rooms through an online portal.
Need: Booking of auditoriums and rooms has always been a cumbersome process involving a lot of paperwork and approaching a number of officials. Despite replacing the paperwork with an online system, the proposal still involves multiple checks and verifications. This seems to be only a slight improvement over the existing system.
Feasibility:
Given the failure of the previous GSec over the (exact) same proposal, the candidate fails to convince how she’s going to implement the same. Lack of proper groundwork is shown as there is no mention of the establishment of the concerned web development team and a proper slot allocation system.
Again, TSA appreciates the candidate’s effort to carry forward her ex-GSec Dusad’s proposals and finds it apt to inform her about the work done so far on this front.
You mentioned about an online portal dedicated to the booking of Kalidas and Netaji auditoriums. No such portal is up. Why?
The academic section is up to it. They have already designed it for the booking of classrooms. We are yet to add the auditoriums section to it. This portal will be accessible by students and professors alike. So a verified and effective payment portal is to be included. We are halfway through and ample work is being done on the same. The assistant registrar is also trying to help us on this project. Once all these trivial issues are sorted, you are very soon going to see the portal.
(excerpt from term review of Vaibhav Dusad,Gsec Socult 2017–18)
P.S.: We hope Dusad’s ‘very soon’ comes during the candidate’s tenure.
Impact: This would reduce a lot of paperwork and provide flexibility in timings while booking rooms and auditoriums. However, the same formalities and multiple checkpoints still remain in the online system.
Proposal 3: To initiate a Social Cause every year for the students of IIT Kharagpur under the ambit of Technology Students’ Gymkhana.
TSA congratulates the candidate on finally managing to come up with something original.
Need: It might be a great way to channelize student efforts towards a social cause and enhance social belongingness among the KGP community.
Feasibility: Not enough groundwork seems to have been shown about the general nature of these events and fund allocation for the same. The idea of competitions and eventual Open IIT events seems vague at best.
Impact: It might be a great way to increase the KGP community’s sense of social responsibility. However, the idea doesn’t seem to be very well-defined for implementation.
Proposal 4: To introduce the event Stand Up Comedy in Open IIT.
Okay, this feels like way too much déjà vu now.
Need: There has been an Inter IIT stand-up event for the past few years. This proposal seems to aim at promoting stand-up culture on the campus and hence improve our performance in stand-up events in Inter IIT Cultural Meet.
Feasibility: Feasibility depends on the student community’s response and enthusiasm for the event.
Again, TSA advises the candidate to see the work done on this front during her predecessor’s tenure seeing that she has once again copied her proposal from GSec 2017–18 Aman Chaudhury.
The only open mic event that was conducted was for the purpose of Inter IIT selections. Your proposal states 3 open mic events to promote the culture of Stand-up Comedy. Also, Stand-up Comedy was not included as an Open IIT event. What all problems occurred?
When the open mic event was conducted in the month of November, we observed that a lot of preparatory work is required to develop the content the participants deliver. Since the audience wouldn’t turn up for a second open mic with same content, it required more time. Taking all this into consideration, we have planned another open mic for this month.
For adding it as an Open IIT event, I am sure it will get a place next year and probably as a GC event in the future, depending upon its popularity and turn up.
(Excerpt from Aman’s term review by TSA)
P.S.: We hope this turns out to be the ‘next year’ Aman talks about.
Impact: If properly implemented unlike before, the proposal can go a long way towards building a proper stand-up culture on campus. This could also improve KGP’s performance in the Inter IIT stand up event.
Candidate 3: Aniket Shah
Proposal 1: To build an online portal for the bill reimbursement of all societies that come under Technology Students’ Gymkhana.
Need: Reimbursement by the Gymkhana to the societies has always been a cumbersome process involving a lot of paperwork and approaching a number of officials. Despite replacing the paperwork with an online system, the proposal still involves multiple checks and verifications. This seems to be only a slight improvement over the existing system.
Feasibility: The proposal properly outlines the detailed working process. However, the candidate fails to show enough groundwork for the actual implementation of the mentioned online portal. There is no mention of any web development team required for the same.
Impact: If properly implemented, it could only slightly reduce societies’ hassle in bill reimbursement by relieving them from paperwork and providing flexibility in timings.
Proposal 2: To introduce Graphic Design Event in both Open IIT and General Championship under the Fine Arts & Design Cup.
Need: There has been a Digital Art competition in Inter IIT for quite a few years now. Introducing Graphic Design as an event in both Open IIT and GC might go a long way towards improving KGP’s performance.
Feasibility: With detailed groundwork, the proposal seems to be pretty feasible. However, the budget allocation has not been mentioned at all.
Impact: With the introduction of new events, the students will be free to explore new avenues of art in tandem with the modern digital world. This could also improve KGP’s performance in relevant Inter IIT events.
Proposal 3: To furnish an Intimate Space Theatre for Socio-Cultural activities so that all the cultural societies and groups get a proper confined facilitated room for overall year-round activities as per requirement.
Need: A consolidated space with proper equipment might help different cultural societies on campus in their practice sessions.
Feasibility: The proposal seems to be a little ambitious. Nothing is mentioned about the venue of the proposed Intimate Space Theatre or the funds required for the infrastructure.
Impact: The proposal(provided it’s implemented) may satisfy societies’ technical requirements. But slot division might be a tad difficult given the number of cultural societies on campus.
Candidate 4: Sagun Jhunjhunwala
Proposal 1: Setting up of Training seminars and workshops
Summary: Introduction of training seminars and workshops for all the students of IIT Kharagpur who are interested to take part in Inter IIT Cultural meet. These seminars and training sessions will be conducted at Netaji/Kalidas auditorium and Vikramshila Complex by artists from various academies/theatres from Kolkata. The workshops will be conducted in several slots for a duration of 10 days at the starting of December. After that shortlisting will be done for the Inter-IIT Cultural meet and the students finally selected will also be trained for their final performances at the Inter-IIT Cultural meet.
Need: “Open to all” workshops are greatly required to increase participation from all members of the student community in Inter IIT cultural contingent rather than confining participation to selected members of the societies of respective genres. Workshops taken by professionals are also necessary to further improve the skills of Inter IIT cultural contingent so that they can perform better.
Feasibility: There doesn’t seem to be enough groundwork done on how to sanction the budget for the proposal.
TSA commends the candidate’s efforts to copy a proposal from 2017–18 Gsec Socult Vaibhav Dusad without even updating the current number of cups in Inter IIT and advises him to learn from his failures.
It was mentioned in your proposal that there will be workshops and training sessions for people wanting to take part in the Inter IIT Social and Cultural Meet but nothing of that sort happened. What is your opinion on this?
This point was mentioned in my budget when the proposal was drafted. But when I approached the institute administration for the same, they denied sanctioning the budget for this.
Do you consider this a fault on part of the administration?
Obviously. When I prepared the budget of 8 lacs and they sanctioned only 2 lacs without even taking my opinion into consideration, then I believe it is the administration which is to be blamed.Although eventually I was sanctioned the entire budget of 8 lacs, but this happened on 13th of December 2017, which was too late for organising any workshops since there was hardly any time left for Inter IIT.
(excerpt from Dusad’s term review by TSA)
TSA wishes the candidate all the best in his endeavour to bring this proposal to fruition and advises him to not take a leaf from Dusad’s book again.
Impact: If implemented, the proposal can go a long way to improve KGP’s performance in Inter IIT Cultural Meet. However, TSA hopes the candidate doesn’t copy Dusad’s implementation procedure too and end up not executing the said proposal.
Proposal 2: Organisation of Social Weekends
Summary: The candidate proposes to organize social weekends, open to all students of IIT Kharagpur, where they will utilize their knowledge in the right direction and take a step forward for the upliftment of the society. This will also help to create a healthy relationship between the staff and the students within the halls and thus, the institute itself.
Need: It might be a great way to channelize students’ efforts towards a social cause and enhance social belongingness among the KGP community.
Feasibility: Although the proposal seems pretty feasible, keeping student participation voluntary rather than ‘ensuring’ it could get the students more involved in the activity. Also, this proposal falls more under the purview of Student Welfare rather than Socult.
Impact: It might be a good way to increase the KGP community’s sense of social responsibility. It might also increase communication between staff and students and make the staff feel more attached to the institute, thus motivating them to work better.
Proposal 3: Introduction of Acoustic Jamming Competition in Open IIT.
Summary: To including two events namely Acoustic Jamming Competition Solo and Acoustic Jamming Competition Group in the Open IIT Competition which invites some of the best musicians and instrumentalists from our campus to sing to the tunes of nature.
Need: Provided there already exist Western and Eastern Instrumentals Open IIT events, there doesn’t seem much need to introduce another instrumental event.
Feasibility: With detailed groundwork, the proposal seems to be pretty feasible. However, the budget allocation has not been mentioned at all.
Impact: Unlikely to make much of an impact as similar events already exist in Open IIT and GC.
Proposal 4: To start a new event named as Cult Café.
Summary: Conduction of bi-weekly informal events showcasing performances in stand-up comedy, beat-boxing, acoustic music, slam poetry and Shayari.
Need: Quite a few students in the Institute feel under-confident to participate in competitions which are conducted at an Open IIT level. A platform like Cult café would allow the students to get multiple chances to come out and try out their talent and thus improve their performance.
Feasibility: The mode of conduction of these events seems to be vague. The frequency of conduction is a bit ambitious. Also, no groundwork has been outlined relating to availing permission at the venues.
Impact: If properly implemented, this might be well received by the KGP community. The cult café could be a spot for creative minds to come together, improving the interaction and scope of both the artist and the audience.
