Illumination at IIT Kharagpur
How could lighting 100000 lamps possibly help college kids?
It was in August 2021 that Sameer and I got to learn about Illumination from Piyush, an IIT Kharagpur (KGP) alum who now leads engineering at Capillary Technologies. Illumination is an inter-hostel competition conducted in IIT KGP during Diwali where the hostels or the residence halls compete with each other to build something larger than life.
For 30 days, building upto Diwali, the students from each hostel collaborate to build massive yet intricate and creative 30-50 feet high art panels (called chatais in Hindi). What's special about them? They are given a form with the help of hundreds of thousands of lamps (diyas). Think of these diyas as the pixels of a picture you take with a camera - there really are so many of them. The chatai built by Piyush and his hall in 2004 had 250000 diyas. And during Diwali, lights are put off for 2 to 3 hours and only diyas light up the campus. There would also be rangolis (coloured pattern design) on the floor that accompanies these chatais.
The hall that wins the Illumination competition (deservedly) gets 1000 rasgullas and a trophy. But Piyush recalls what's really invaluable is the learning and experience you get from the month long effort building upto the final exhibition - it’s the journey that really matters:
Students experience what it takes to build something larger than life. They learn to see what can be achieved when they work as a collective.
They learn that big ambitions go hand-in-hand with grit, commitment and hard work - 3-4 hours / day for a month in this case.
They appreciate the importance of working as a team. Usually a team comprises 50-60 students (~ 12% of a hostel). They understand the need to divide efforts, work efficiently as smaller teams, communicate efficiently, all of this while having a vision in mind.
They learn that at the end of the Illumination event, everyone emerges a winner. For they realise it's not really about the best panel in the competition. It's about the journey that each of them go through, putting their best self forward every moment.
It's no accident that many alumni from IIT KGP have evolved to become leaders and entrepreneurs, building conscious companies like Capillary Technologies. It is initiatives like the Illumination that help in sowing seeds to groom thoughtful leaders. They encourage students to push their boundaries, appreciate the value of playing the team game, be empathetic to others, inculcate a healthy competitive spirit and become a better version of themselves.