Anaadyanta is the annual fest at my college, Nitte Meenakshi Institute of Technology (NMIT).

This fest will always be one of my fondest memories of college days. Along with Harish (Gunda), Sashi, Manohar, Vinay Kharade and several others, I was responsible for conceiving, planning and organising the very first fest at NMIT. I am proud to say that even the name of the fest was given by me! :)

Being a fan of Indian myth and epic, it was only natural for me to dive into that ocean to look for a name. While several options came up, I selected this, as it literally means ‘without beginning or end’. Creativity and talent has no limits and that was the idea behind choosing the name. Anaadyanta is also a name given to Lord Shiva.

We had some amazing moments in planning and organising this fest. Since we had nothing to base the fest upon (being the very first fest), we had to do everything from scratch and it was no easy task.

We had some amazing moments trying to convince the management about everything, right from serious issues to trivial issues. Be it the actual fest itself to issues like stage height or about calling a rock band (we eventually called Moksha!) or event list or prize money. Everything was under scrutiny and nothing was spared! We were constantly questioned. We proposed, they opposed! Ultimately after a lot of discussions and arguments they agreed to most of our demands and we agreed to most of theirs and went ahead with the fest!

Also we had extremely limited budgets (the management wasn’t sure if the fest will become a hit or if it was worth spending so much money which could be used elsewhere, considering ours was a new college). Getting sponsors was a huge task, as nobody was ready to invest without knowing what returns on investment they will get and hardly anybody had even heard of the college then!

Harish, Sashi and I spent countless hours together covering countless kilometres to countless companies, talking about the fest and asking for sponsorship and support. Not everyone was forthcoming, infact no one was! Some were even rude and left us embarrassed! Finally we managed to get some sponsors, who though didn’t invest in large amounts, somehow contributed to the fest!

At several moments during the planning stages, we weren’t sure if the fest was going to be a reality. We had a lot of barriers to cross and a lot of discouragement to counter. Finally when everything was finalized, we even had a postponement to deal with, thanks to some issue at college! And a day before the original fest date, we called up colleges to inform them of the change in dates!! But somehow we saw it through!

Most of the time Harish, Sashi and myself were together during the planning for this fest.

There are some moments that we will never forget, such as -

Getting our first poster printed. It was more of a teaser, to be put up in our own college, breaking the event and hyping it amongst our own students first! That night at Rajajinagar, when we got the printed posters in our hands, we were all extremely emotional and it was Just the beginning! Even when we got the other main posters and literature printed later, we had the same feelings of delight!

All the hours sitting at Pizza Hut in Sadashivnagar and Coffee Day in Malleshwaram planning and thinking and replanning and brainstorming and sharing one glass of unlimited Pepsi by three!!

The drive back from visiting some sponsor when I braked suddenly in traffic to avoid banging into a scooter that suddenly came in our path. The scooter guy panicked on hearing my car screech and banged into the car in front (both in an extremely funny way!) When the car driver came out to shout at the scooter guy, he started pointing at us while we were laughing our heads off! Finally the signal turned green and everyone moved on. None of us can forget that moment!

The very first sound check in campus! The guys from Audio Touch were able to set up the speakers and sound system at something like 3 AM after a lot of trouble with the stage guys. The Audio Touch guys turned on the speakers in full blast and played Hotel California! I can never forget that moment, in the middle of the night, standing on our stage for our very first Anaadyanta, after months of planning and hard work and uncertainty, listening to that amazing song by The Eagles. When this first sound check happened all the hostelites and other students who were still on campus all freaked out and came running to the venue, to celebrate. Anaadyanta was here and how!

Realising Gunda had given the stage backdrop guys the spelling of the fest name, wrongly as “Anaadynata”, when they put up the backdrop on the morning of the fest! We then corrected the mistake by cutting out the ‘n’ and the ‘a’ and interchanging them to form “Anaadyanta”!

All our experiences with our college dean, Mr. N.R. Shetty and with our inimitable fest coordinator, Mr. Natarajan! We always had to have extra print outs of every document ready!

And last but not the least, how can I forget “Whose Father What Goes?!” :D

Ultimately Anaadyanta ‘04 was a great fest with huge participation from several colleges, including the top colleges of that time. The fest was a resounding success and everybody and everything came together over the last few days and all the various committees did their best to put up a great show!

The reason this blog post came up, is because I got all nostalgic after seeing the new core committee go all out in conducting Anaadyanta ‘08. It was held recently and they even came up with an Anaadyanta theme music and a dance performance based on the theme music!

Enjoy the video and the Anaadyanta theme!

Music composed and arranged by : Skanda
Vocals: Suchetan R , Sushruth
Dance by: Preetham and group

This is a very proud moment for me and my fellow Anaadyanta core committee members!

Btw for all that we did to create Anaadyanta – we guys from the first core committee were rewarded with a cup of coffee and some biscuits in the Principal’s office. It was the most satisfying cup of coffee we’d ever had! :)