There are two things that have driven me to madness this year. The first one is my committee work, some of which is still left with the upcoming Lit Fest. The other one is the Keep India Clean Campaign.
It all started in October when I and my friend Abhinit decided that we should go all out to participate in a few events in the 5th term. So we narrowed down some events based on the kind of things we were interested in. The first and the closest one to both of us was Mycampaign and this blog is about the three month long experience we had while participating in this event.
The entries that were asked were promptly sent. In the first round we sent an executive summary for the “Keep India Clean Campaign” that we had conceptualised, followed by a complete marketing plan in the second round. The results were out soon. We made it to the final 5 of My Campaign. We were going to IIM Indore!!
For the third round of My Campaign, we had to run a blog for 10 days. This round really taught us a few lessons. Firstly, we never thought how difficult it would be to post regular content on a blog. Secondly, our decision to go ahead with two members while all the other teams had three really had us making a lot of extra effort. But we did post good content. Our aim was originality and creativity. We succeeded on both fronts. As this round went along we became more and more involved with the cause. We did research. We did a signature campaign In our college. We did a broadcast on radio. And then we went to the village and met people to find out what their problems are. At the end of the blogging round we were not just satisfied with the kind of work we had done, but wiser with the experience we had just been through.
The fourth and fifth rounds were On-Campus. We went to IIM Indore in an unforgettable bus journey. The lesser said the better. Given the time constraints we had while booking the tickets though, it was something we could live with. On our entry into the campus we were greeted with huge signboards which read “Have you seen 30 judges for 5 teams?? Witness the grilling today!!” And so we got a sense of what awaited us.
We got our presentation ready. The first On Campus round was in front of 30 opinion leaders from in and around Indore. Dressed in Kurtas, we went in and started presenting. We spoke for about 15 minutes. When we were done there was pin drop silence in the room. Then suddenly the entire audience started clapping. The first thing that we heard from a judge in the Q&A round was “I don’t have a question. I just want to say that your campaign emotionally connected with me”. We answered some more questions and when we were done, we were on top of the world. Outside, we met the people from the panel who all personally congratulated us for coming up with such a campaign. Two of them belonging to NGOs said that “We do run NGOs, but not at this level!”
Next round we faced 3 judges. My experience with the first spot during presentations has generally been bad. You don’t know what to expect from the judges and the judges have not gauged the level of the competitors, so they tend to experiment on you. Although, I personally think we did better this time, one of the judges didn’t think so. We got a cold response from him. Sadly, after 5 rounds of the campaign, we had managed to convince 32 judges. But we didn’t convince the one that mattered. We came in third. I personally think we were good enough for the first spot.
But the whole experience was unbelievable. By the end of the campaign, we had shot 5 videos, more than the total videos I had shot in MICA before. We had made numerous print ads, written articles, designed a mascot, logo, created facebook and twitter pages and most importantly raised awareness about this cause among a lot of people. We were sad that we didn’t win, but the experience we gained was worth a million dollars. And no snooty judge can take that away from us.
