So, what was the prime focus while gearing up for Pearl and what was the roadmap of planning while keeping a particular goal in mind?
Jayanth- So, this time for Pearl, our main intention was to be the largest fest in South India. So, the college we had to beat was SARANG, IIT Madras, their cultural fest. So that was the main goal. So, we had to scale up the entire fest, the events, the lineup.
And we also had to focus on the cultural aspects, have more events, and have more colleges coming. So, our main goal was to increase the footfall on campus, to have a much larger fest, attract a lot of sponsorship, and overall make it South India’s largest fest. So that was the goal behind the whole theme of Pearl this time. And it is focused on Hyderabad. So, we have our theme Streets of Hyderabad. So, we wanted to show people coming in, the whole flavors of Hyderabad.
And the roadmap that you follow to make it successful?
Jayanth-. So, we started the preparation of Pearl immediately post-atmos. So, the senate was always focused. We didn’t have much work until now from December related to cultural activities. So, the majority of it went into planning Pearl. And once we had the arena, we started planning for the arena. And then we had SHANGRI-LA as a precursor to Pearl. And later we hosted Renaissance. And then we were all geared up for Pearl. And because we started very early, we had clarity on what events we wanted to host. And we, even the president and the general secretary were very much focused on all the fest equally and we gave the right amount of priority to Pearl, we almost started planning pearl parallelly to Arena. We even had Pearl work going on during arena . So, that was something which I felt was a very major point in the roadmap of Pearl.
How do you incorporate feedback from previous Fests into the planning of the present fests?
Harshini- I think one of the primary aspects of conducting fests is that the general body’s opinion matters a lot to the SUC and we always constantly keep in mind what their issues and what their targets are. Even as discussed in the GBM, though I was not a member of SUC then, but as I’ve been working with the President, the General Secretary and my Co-Cultural Secretary, they keep in mind and constantly collect feedback from the general body from the respective Secretaries of the Cultural Senate, etc. their wishes and accommodation as frequently as possible. And they do collect a good database and maintain a lot of their requests and hold a lot of meetings frequently so that the ideas are gathered pretty well and catered to nicely.
So, what were the major drawbacks from last fest that you are trying to avoid this time?
Jayanth-So, during our elections, I had spoken to most of the secretary’s last time. So, we had a lot of input of what actually went into the planning of Pearl last time. So, the main thing they point out is that FOB wasn’t involved too much and many of the additions were not respected. So that’s something I wanted to change this time. So, me and my co-secretary we always respect the opinion of the senate, we go by the majority. So, if someone has a unique opinion, we do value it and we do respect it. And we do cater to how we could go forward with the same. So, if something is feasible, we surely try to go ahead with the same. And we do value our FOB a lot this time. And you can see that in the first. So, everyone is very happy working and we don’t have many differences. In case there is a difference, we immediately try to solve it. And so, we are a happy senate moving forward to a great pearl.
How did you both divide your roles as male and female cultural secretary, given that you joined two weeks back?
Harshini– Right, so taking up that question, I think firstly I was welcomed very well into the senate and as a member of the SUC. One of my prime goals as entering as the cultural secretary, given the delay, was to execute and help and assist these people in the ideas they’ve already framed, which have been so beautifully received by the GB as well. And it also helps to a large extent that our ideas or our thinking lines match and they still do and we constantly keep each other updated regarding what is to be done, whatever ideas that we have. And we do ensure that all of them are communicated, especially we ensure that there’s a very healthy line of communication between the both of us. We divide work as and when required, we share loads, try our level best to ensure nobody’s over-burdened as part of the senate, secretaries, or ensure that everything is running smoothly while there’s fun involved.
Talking about ideas, what is?
Jayanth– So, one thing is the plus part of having a co-secretary is you’re always on your toes. If there’s something not happening, the other person knows that this has to be done. So, we are always kept on our feet and we try to complete our work ASAP. And it’s always fun to work with a co-secretary because you know what’s happening. It’s not only one person taking on the pressure, the other person also knows how it’s done. And when you have two people making the decisions, you turn out to make the better ones. So, you can actually discuss and you both are the decision makers at the same time. So, I’ve had a lot of fun working with Harshini. to be done at that point, like right at that point. So, it’s been a very fun experience.
What qualities really made the planning of Pearl a success in each of you? What qualities do you observe in each other?
Harshini-OK, I’ll go first. I think Jayanth has a plan and a goal. And he’s a very goal oriented person. He knows what he wants. And that is what he has kind of imbibed in the kind of manifestos that he had, and the kind of ideas that he has. And I think that it is really nice to have an idea or a roadmap. It is easier to work through stuff that is something that I really admire about him and he’s also very focused towards and dedicated especially towards the cultural senate. He always ensures that their needs are met even before I was there. I’m pretty sure and I’ve heard about this as well that he collects everybody’s concerns, he ensures all of them are addressed all the time and he always gets back to me saying how do we make it better, how do we make it easier for them and ensures that all of that feedback is taken into consideration. So yeah, I think he’s a very dedicated and concerned person who likes to get the best out of his team.
Jayanth– Again, with Harshini, I really like the way she’s very dedicated to the work she’s taken up and the way she communicates with people is really amazing. So, she actually goes to the point, and it’s very easy to take orders from her. So even the simplest of the message to the Senate, she gets it very clear. So, she gets work done very simply. And also, any work assigned to her, is very quick and she loves having her work done as the first priority. So, if there’s some work, she’s going to get it done. And also, one thing is she’s very good with the admin as well. She has connections all the way around the campus. And I would say as a co-secretary, I’ve known her for two weeks, but I feel l has done an amazing job for the past two weeks.
Okay, so can you provide a… like… statistics on how many events are planned for Pearl and how many were planned last time and how have you scaled up on the cultural senate part concerned to Pearl?
Harshini– There are 19 cultural clubs as you know and most of them this time have at least four to five events so there are a total of about 61 events happening and adding onto the previous edition of Pearl ‘24 there are 14 additional cultural events happening as part of this cultural fest and I think it was beautifully conceptualized which I think Jayanth can take up better.
Jayanth-So, the main thing to increase the scale of the cultural fest is to increase the level of the fest by increasing the prize money. So that’s the main feedback we got from the senate. So, the most important thing is to keep the prize money attractive so that a greater number of colleges take part. And also, at same time we were increasing the quality of the event by having much better judges. So, judges and prize money were the two main crucial factors. that we got as an input from the senate and we did cater to the same. Also scaling up the line up of the pro-shows helped a lot because people were attracted to the names and so are the registrations. So, we feel that was the main part in scaling up the fest.
How do you ensure that quality has really been raised for each event?
Jayanth-So, the quality is increased because one we have all the inventory requirements catered, second, we have the prize money scaled up. So that’s how we ensure the quality is scaled.
What have you done differently for publicity from last year given that the post for the artists came out less than a week before pearl?
Harshini-Right, so one of the most unique parts about publicity this time around is that we have executed plans that are veryunique and interesting. We have a great offline publicity schedule in place which includes a lot of flash mob performances across different malls, across popular events in the city and a lot of performances across different areas where there is great crowd. We also have a dedicated department of publicity and public relations who are doing a great job and we hope they attract more audiences and participants. And given the amazing line up that already is, we hope this is the biggest that has ever been!
Okay, coming to the most awaited event of Pearl, what inspired the idea of Pearl Ball and how did you go about implementing this given that this is a completely new event that we have not seen in the last few years?
Jayanth-Okay, an event which last happened in 2017. So, Pearl Ball is an event exclusively for couples. So, Pearl Ball was a concept by our seniors in the 2014 batch for the first time. So, they had it exclusively for 100 couples where people spent their time, they had the private time. So, it used to be happening in SAC before. So, they used to close their entire SAC. And there used to be deductions taken for food and lighting as it is an exclusive event it’s not fair for the entire GB to be funding something for only 200 members. So that was the reason there was a heavy deduction that was taken in 2016.
We had the Pearl Ball OC from almost a month before Pearl. Immediately post-GBM, we wanted to go ahead with Pearl Ball. So even during the GBM, we had a rough idea of how we would like to make Pearl Ball. So, we have selected the new acads as the venue. And we have a lot in store right now. We have the Inaug planned. We have a lot of games planned. We have the karaoke night and the main Pearl Ball dance. And we have a lovely moon light dinner for them, so that’s the whole plan.
This time the first has been scaled up significantly. This is very clear with the expected footfall and with the pro-shows planned. What has been done to improve the culture of the campus through the cultural clubs?
Harshini-Right, so I think the cultural clubs have been pretty active in the respect of conducting a lot of events from their end and also a lot of internal, members-engaging activities like game nights or there are a lot of meetings that are held within the cultural clubs themselves. There is a culture that they try to foster within their own clubs so that they can involve their members better. And also, I think you we can mention that Shangri-La and Renaissance that have already been conducted, which also significantly try to involve the majority of Bitsians and the majority of people on campus. And especially this time we have another one additional day given that Pearl being a 4-day event, 28th, which we tried to incorporate the fact that a lot of Bitsians are participating, given it’s a Thursday so that special attention is also given to them and they also have an exclusive access over a lot of events, we expect more Bitsians to participate and use the avenues to participate in more cultural events.
What are some of the challenges faced while planning the entire fest on such a large scale? Were there any times when it felt impossible to deal with them?
Jayanth-So, one major thing was… hosting the events on the public platform. So, we had to finalize which platform we had to host and also get the access from the third party when using the third-party websites. So even right now we are yet to put our pro-shows online. So, we’ll be putting them up soon. So that’s where we faced the major roadblocks. So, getting the advances from the admin was a bit of a hassle. So, once we closed arena, we could get pearl advances and now things are getting smooth but yes at one point we did face difficulties and that was the reason we had our artists line up only one week prior to the fest. Our initial plan was to at least have it 15 days early but due to the delay in the advances we had to keep it one week away and even now we’re still kicking in the registration. It’s not an easy path, it’s obviously going to be hard but yeah that’s the beauty of the fest.
Harshini– Well maybe adding on to that I think given that I’ve joined at such a later time but working with all of these people, it makes me realize that nothing is impossible. They’ve always ensured, given the way the fest has turned out and what they have promised, it has been an absolute blockbuster. And I’m pretty sure there’s nothing called impossible in these people’s dictionaries. And being an addition to the SUC as a part of them is a great honor to me!
What events do you guys look forward to most this time?
Jayanth-So, this time the most… the event we look forward to the most is going to be the Laser Tag, Horror House and there’s going to be Pearl Ball obviously. And even Terpsichore has been scaled up. Till deaf -do we part is also going to be held with the Pro Show set up, so that’s going to be very exciting.
Do you have any confirmed contingents from colleges or can you give an approx. number of registrations that we have?
Jayanth-So, confirmed the number of colleges. So, there have been many individual registrations from colleges right now. So, the whole college contingent, they usually book it very late because they still have to get the permissions from the administration. And as I mentioned, our registration links were up late, but we are still pushing forward. So, there have been many queries from a lot of colleges. I think NIT Rourkela is one which is confirmed. Other local colleges are in the pipeline but most of the local colleges are expected to register in the last two or three days so.
This year our cultural senate teams have participated a lot in other colleges. Has it in any way contributed in a footfall in our college?
Jayanth-Surely, surely. So, they’ve met a lot of teams outside so they do have personal contacts right now and they’re inviting most of them and there’s been a lot of positive response from all of them and the main reason why they participate outside, people know that yes BPHC exists and there is a team of this level. So, we have gone out and shown our talent and we have won in many of the places so even in Bits goa waves we have won many laurels for BPHC. Same with all the local tournaments and the fest we participated in Hyderabad.
So, for Pearl. Personally, what do you feel if you were to attend a particular event? Which would be the first one to attend a cultural senate or cultural club event?
Jayanth-Okay, I would be attending the general quiz because it has a very good quiz master this time and also, they have a very good set of quiz questions and obviously the prize money is very exciting. It’s very lucrative and the next event I would like to watch out for is a solo, solo dance competition and we are getting many exciting participants and we also have our own cypher with their best members participating in the solo.
Harshini-The events that I am looking forward to especially this time apart from of course the ones that Jayanth has already mentioned are Glitterati and the group dance competition, Terpsichore, there are professional judges coming externally this time for a lot of our headliner events and they’re people with a lot of great ideas and all the events have been very well executed and very well planned so those are events that I think everybody should watch out for.
Okay so a common problem that we face during Atmos and Pearl as well is that we may get external participation for the activities that we host. There is a lack of internal participation. Most of the Bitsian’s get engaged in managing the events or either sitting in the room. How do you ensure that Bitsian’s themselves get out of their room and participate in the events that are hosted by the Cultural Senate?
Jayanth-So as Harshini mentioned before, we have an extra day exclusively for the Bitsians. I mean we give most priority for Bitsians to participate in the events. So, we are giving a holiday and there’s no major pro show on that day. It’s only going to be the comedy evening, the comedy show. So, we are looking out for a lot of Bitsians participation on day one and that would encourage people to also participate on day two, three and four. So that is one main move we have done. Also, we have encouraged our clubs to keep many events for the public, like for this general body, so it’s not so tough to participate in them. So, I’ve asked each club to have one event which is very easy for GB to participate in and have fun. So yes, we have planned the schedule in such a way that it’s convenient for Bitsians to participate and also the publicity is going to be the same level for Bitsians.
Harshini– Adding on to that I think events like Pearl Ball have been made Bitsian exclusive so we wanted to keep it that way so that a lot of Bitsians do explore those avenues and opportunities, these kinds of events would push them to be a part of the events more and enjoy themselves more and truly enjoy the experience of being a Bitsian.
Okay, last final message to GB for Pearl.
Harshini– Yeah, I think Pearl this time is the biggest fest you will ever encounter in the entirety of South India and it has been planned with such a great level of energy, enthusiasm, a lot of love and a lot of labor and the only thing that we would require or we would be massively grateful to the GB is to be supportive and enjoy the events as much as possible because there is nothing beyond that the FOB would require. There’s a great team and there’s great effort going into every single thing. And all this is happening so that we massively scale up the fest. It’s not just about scaling the fest up but it’s about scaling up the fest experience primarily. So yes, please have fun. Enjoy is the only thing that I would say.
Jaynath– So, my message would be, Pearl has been the dream of the SUC. So, we have done everything possible to have a great Pearl. And to make it South India’s largest fest, we need the support of the entire general body. So please come out and enjoy all the events. We have great pro shows lined up for you. We have amazing events down the lane. We have great talk shows. So, we have done everything possible. A lot of labor has gone in. A lot of love for BPHC, looking forward to having a great pearl with all of you.
The Journal Club 
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