Maharashtra Utsav

The Cultural Department is an imperative part of the D.G . Ruparel College. With activities going on year round, our college has been a part of state level competition called Maharashtra Utsav. This year, I had the privilege of being a part of the MU Team. My role in MU was limited to one event only i.e Folk dance. The folk dance to be performed was called as Kalbeliya. It is a folk dance that belongs to the North-West State of India i.e Rajasthan.  Folk Dance in general requires lot of energy and stamina. It is considered to be one of the most hectic dance forms, ours was not an exception. My team consisted of 10 members including me. The day we reached the rehearsal hall, we were told about the dance form and also that the time limit given was approximately 8-10 mins. All of it seemed impossible during the initial days, with us attending lectures in the morning and then spending the entire afternoon rehearsing! We were extremely unsure of ourselves.

Ruparel's Kalbeliya Team

Dance has always been a passion since the time I can remember. This passion has taken me places and has also helped me grow as a person. So was the case for the rest of my crew members. Each and every team participating in Maharashtra Utsav had been putting in all they had, their hearts and souls into the part they play. The passion existing within each and every one of them was unbelievable.

The atmosphere at Ravindra Natya Mandir (the competition venue) gets into you so much that it is almost like an addiction that only charges you up to hear the crowd cheering your college’s name.

Students here work day in and out just to glorify Ruparel. I guess this energy got into me too. The seemingly impossible goal as set and was to be achieved within a matter of 15 days. And I was seeing myself working hard, outside my comfort zone, learning something new every day. There were days when we just wanted to give up. With stretching and warm-up sessions everyday designed to increase our flexibility and stamina, there were days when each and every muscle in our bodies ached. But that in no way was to stop us from working hard. It was almost like we were drunk in passion. The only thing that gave us motivation was the picture of us holding the trophy in our hands.

Our choreographer Miss Apoorva Undalkar (Tai as we fondly called her) was the one standing strong behind us, shaping our each and every movement. Her untiring efforts got us where we are. There were tears, pain, even blood (due to the stunts) that only made us stronger and more determined to reach our goal. Unfortunately, the efforts put in took us through the elimination round but we did not win a place in the finals. But it was a great learning experience. As individuals, we sure were great dancers, but this event brought us together and made us a team. We learned so much more too, group cohesiveness is one of those things, we learned an altogether new dance form, and most importantly we learned to stand up again if we fell on our way to success. We lost the competition but in turn we earned so much more, we made some wonderful memories, I earned some great friends. In this entire process, each and every member of our team went from “I” to “we”. I do not think that we are a team, in fact they all my dancing family now!

 -Anuja Tilak