Mumbai: IIT Bombay's 52nd Mood Indigo makes a grand return

Mumbai: IIT Bombay's Mood Indigo began even before one could step into the Powai based campus. It started from the Kanjurmarg station where flocks of students with their luggage, guitars, and skateboards began mingling with each other as they hitched a ride together to the vast IIT grounds.

Students were seen swarming the campus gates at the break of dawn on Tuesday, December 27, as the institute's undergraduate batch launched the first day of its 52nd Mood Indigo, a grand student-run festival, which had nearly 1.5lakh registrants this year.

Campus shuttles, rental bikes, skateboarders, and groups of pedestrians had taken over the IIT streets since morning, navigating their way to the dorms and then the events. The Day 1 began with all the grandeur it could gather as students flaunted their styles in Mood-I's 'Vogue', a fashion show contest. The show was an opportunity for budding designers and models to catch the eyes of contest judge Deep Supriyam, an Indian Supermodel, and Sarabjeet Saluja, the founder of Saundh, India.

Nearly 40 teams put up catchy shows based in sync with the central Vogue theme of 'confluence of eras in fashion'. The performers brought in fusion of styles from the roman era, victorian times, and even the industrial revolution. The team from Mithibai College in Mumbai bagged the title of the best participating theme.

"I remember winning vogue three years in a row back when I used to be in college," said Yatin Gandhi, the choreographer for the Mithibai college team. Gandhi went on to tell the students the importance of professionalism and carrying oneself well in a fashion show. "Dancing cannot be synonyms to walking the ramps, that's not what judges look for," he said.

The event was followed by an interview with Anurag Kashyap, Alaya F, and Karan Mehta. The three launched the first music video of their upcoming film based on a podcaster, called 'Almost Pyaar with DJ Mohabbat'. The trio discussed their acting practices while shooting the film, while the two budding stars joked about Kashyap's improv style of shooting films. "When actors are given scripts beforehand, one can tell that they are just performing statements they have memorised.

Humans speak to each other through the eye, the audience can tell how fabricated rehearsed lines look when they see an actor's eyes," explained Kashyap. The artists reminisced about the six-year-long journey of releasing the film, and working through the pandemic years.

The interview was followed up with the captivating Aagaaz, or Hindi Street Play, qualifier rounds, where the performing teams from various colleges gave their best in hopes of making it to the finals. Teams from 20 colleges performed before a panel of 3 judges, the names of the colleges remained concealed to prevent any bias. The teams made use of strong dialogues, vocals, chanting, instruments, and movements, catching all the eyeballs around the Students Gymkhana.

The students wrote 7 to 8 minute long plays about themes like marital rape, independent thought, and superficiality. After the performances, a judge sat down with each team and gave them a thorough feedback for their performance. "We had a solid 30 minute discussion with our judge and his feedback helped a lot," said Anvita Shekar, from the IIT Madras street play team. "Initially, we planned on performing the play as it is in other Inter-IIT contests, thanks to his feedback we'll be making some major changes to our performance for good," she added.

Through the hubbub of all these events, students were still arriving and settling down within the campus, putting up in IIT hostels. Many cherished Mood-I as their first time away from home. "I have never been outside Rajasthan alone to a youth event like this. It's just day one and it has been very fun, the Mood - Indigo parade which happened before the fest was my favourite so far," said Sneha Kaushal, a student of Manipal University in Jaipur.

Another student from Delhi came to Mood Indigo without any intention of doing so. "I was backpacking from Ahmedabad to Mumbai, exploring the cities, when I heard about Mood Indigo. I knew it's a 'must see' factor of IIT Bombay. So I simply called my friend at the institute and asked whether I could live with him and just like that my plan worked out," said a student from Delhi Technological University.

From playing virtual reality games to getting their hair curled at sponsor booths, students were seen trying everything they could get their hands on. Dominated by youngsters, the event also made way for the Alumni who were attending their reunion at the IIT. The batch of '96 were taken back to their old days on campus. "I remember how the younger students were posted as security in my days at Mood-I. We would try to get into good books with our seniors to get posted in a location which has a good view of the concert," said Arjun Saxena, an IIT alum.

IIT professors didn't want to miss out on this action either, many were seen attending the event along with their families. "I have been attending Mood Indigo for ages now and it's always very fun. The events have been great but I know it's the evening concerts that will steal the show," said Prof CA Varadraj Bapat from SJMSOM, IIT's school of Management.

The evening wound up with various workshops, a creators panel, Women's Panel, The International Music Festival where students lined up to see the much awaited performance by Nikhil D'Souza.

Mood Indigo will host 240 competitions over a span of four days with students from over 4000 colleges participating in these events.