Day 1- YELL WEEK begins

Event 1-Mock Press

The YELL week was formally declared open.

Judges-KK, Buroshiva Sir, Sameer

There was a tingle of anticipation in the air; many excited faces could be seen milling around the lobby just before the call for registration was made. Once the event was on, the audience as well as the participants were looking forward to the proceedings. There were two kinds of people: people who had never seen a mock press and some who had seen mock press’. Suffice to say that, what would follow would turn out to be a unique experience for both.

The event was divided into two rounds. The participants would play first the role of an interviewer and then that of an interviewee during the course of the event. The first character, Amitabh Bachchan was played by Meera. And she did manage to scare people. But everything was taken well by the participants as true sportsmanship would demand.

In this round the participants were asked to interview celebrities which seemed to amuse the audience. As the event progressed, it got interesting and eventually became out of the ordinary. Many times witty replies were exchanged. They were laughed off sportively, by the audience and the participants.

Serious issues were dealt in a funny way during the first round. Personalities like Rajnikant, Amartya Sen, Tom Cruise were interviewed by the participants with panache and wit. But the highlight of the event turned out to be the second round. In this second and last round, the participants who were previously the interviewers got to sit on the other side of the tabe by being the interviewee. The judges threw questions at the participants while they volleyed good answers that were just as hard hitting.

The very first of the second ‘interviewee’ round, was a tirade of questions and answers between the most entertaining Laloo Prasad Yadav and the equally enterprising judges. A hearty laugh later, the mood was set for a set of heated and yet extremely engaging ‘conversations’ if they could be called that between the participants and the judges posing as very persistent reporters. The personalities that followed, included Shilpa Shetty, Narendra Modi, M.F. Hussain, and George Bush.

Shilpa Shetty was questioned about her sudden celebrity status and her flop films other than the controversial Gere kiss.
Narendra Modi was questioned about the condition of Gujarat and his new slogan.
M.F. Hussain was asked about the relevance of his paintings to the common man and about the abuse of art in general.
Mahmoud Ahmedejad was questioned about his country being the stage for a third world war and he returned that if it was to be it would be and that if the USA treated his country as dirt beneath their feet, he would retaliate despite his policy of peace.
George Bush was asked about the American public developing a sense of discontent towards his policies especially the wars.
Anil Ambani was questioned about his family dispute and why he doesn’t use a pipeline rather than trucks which congest traffic.
Shoiab Akhtar was told that it is strange that he’s either in a controversy or injured all the time.

The claps and the laughs, that could be heard throughout, were more than enough evidence that the event was not only liked by the participants and the judges but the audience enjoyed it the most! It ended on a thankful note to the volunteers (Meera, Anna, Shankar, Vishnu, Kaushik, Ajinkya), organisers (Priya, Anisha, Ajiknya), the very responsive audience and last but not at all the least, the participants.