A Dummy's Guide to Selecting a DU College Society

The new session of Delhi University started a little over a month ago and if things still go about like they used to when I was in college, college society auditions must be at their peak right now. Or maybe things happen too soon nowadays and the recruitments have already been done. But loyalty towards the society in the first two months is equivalent to Charlie Sheen for at least half the new recruits. So, if you plan to ditch your current society and join another in the guise of “my parents don’t allow me to stay back so late”, here’s your guide to deciding on which college society to join.

Street Play

The Street Play society is one of the most sought after societies in college. I mean, why wouldn’t anything that recognizes your talent in being able to shout at the top of your voice for hours together and sing raunchy ‘90s songs like “chhat pe soya tha behnoi” be appealing! This society will probably have the most number of rounds when it comes to auditions, but trust me, the only basis they reject you on is “bhai, yeh banda bada South Delhi type hai; iske bass ki nahi hai”. Except, if you’re a hot girl. I mean, let’s not kid ourselves, every society in a co-ed DU college has a hot girl quota.

To be able to fit in, you must have an undying love for street food, a collective crush on the lead dancer from the Dance Society, a soul that cannot keep itself from dancing to the dhol and a palate for adrak wali chai. Don’t worry about the script; the seniors will anyway not accept anything that you write, and mostly work on it themselves. The boys must look earthy with stubbles that would give Markand Deshpande a complex. Parallely, the women needn’t worry too much; they just signed up for a free daily mud pack for the next three years of their lives. Stubble, optional.

Being a member of this society will be a brilliant thing to put on your CV because it’ll teach you team work and blah blah among other important things like how to not let the person who bought Maggi from the canteen have it himself, and how to fit thirteen people in an auto rickshaw and then not even care to check if it breaks a world record because abhi toh dhol bhi fit kar lenge.

Dance Society

Now, I'm a firm believer of the fact that every woman is beautiful and the media presents a very skewed image of what should be considered good looking *cue for the feminists to applaud*, but let's just say that the Dance Society kind of, by chance, in a way happens to house all the women from college who fit the image projected by the media in a great way. But it's such a strange coincidence because the street play peeps dance most to Yo Yo Honey Singh when the muse for all his music is in the Dance Society.

To fit in this club of showstoppers, you need to be extremely hoity-toity but believe otherwise. I mean, you don't wear Zara and then dance to cheap Hindi music for fun. You dance to cheap Hindi music because you want crazy audience response during your performance at the next college fest, or because you think OMG, this new song is so funny and chhichhora, he he he. Also, an affinity towards green-room girl politics masked under glittery eye-shadow is kind of a given.

The guys will mostly only be a handful in this woman dominated club, and be well built. But whatevs, they're just needed to flex muscles, lift some women during performances and do the usual moon walk shit.

Music Society

Being able to play an instrument or sing beautifully isn't the only requirement of MuSoc. You must, at all times, be ready to sing a Happy Birthday song in harmony whenever you find out about someone's birthday. As a girl, you must be sugary sweet, just like your voice and be able to rock the Western accent like no other while singing an English song, and then also amaze everyone with an equally beautiful Shreya Ghoshal cover. The boys may either part their hair from the side like a nona bacha and proudly exhibit the fashion in which they meet the expectations that Hindustani Music had of them, or be the complete opposite with a goatee, crazy hair and a band with a name like Fusion Mafia Collective something.

A collective hatred for Punjabi Music from anyone other than Jaspinder Narula and a love for Coke Studio and Coldplay is a prerequisite. Also, member of MuSoc or not, you can’t help but be friends with these guys! They’re pretty awesome.

Commerce/Economics/Entrepreneurship/Marketing Society

The mystery of the purpose of this society’s existence will bring Agrasen ki Baoli to shame. These guys will organize one event towards the end of the year and will be mostly seen freaking out about “bhai, koi contact nikaal sponsorship ke liye”. I don’t see the point in why they get to gloat about being a part of a society the whole year round. The only skill you require to get in is to have a relative who will be ready to sponsor the event. Most of their work involves arranging for flower bouquets and mementos for the judges, and go around for sponsorship meetings. Also, if they fear that people might not turn up for the event, they’ll put in a word with the Principal, who will make it mandatory for everyone to attend with threats of compulsory attendance or some such.

More publicized than the event will be their after party photos on facebook, which are nothing but pictures of a bunch of people dressed in formals having dinner at Berco’s. Also, someone needs to tell them to stop going on about how much of a success the show was.

Another word of caution: If the society members tell you that one of the benefits of joining would be that you would get the experience of organizing an event, which is like a crazy big deal with companies when they come for placements; trust me, it’s not. You don’t even get to officially go for Antaragni or Oasis at IIT-K and BITS, Pilani, respectively. What’s the point in getting to go about: “Bhai, unofficially jaane mein koi panga toh nahi hai?” all the time!

Probably the only reason you should apply for this club is if you’re one of those start-up guys who has a photo of Steve Jobs as your computer wallpaper and you keep making random websites all the time. It’ll just go with your image; that’s it.

Others

The Placement Cell will have people who believe their stint will help them secure better placements at the end of three years. Also, they have an air of self importance that says, “I’m in the P-Cell, I’m so smart, you’re so dumb. Haha.” I mean, they’re nice people, helping us get placements and all, but some of them just need to drop the attitude a notch.

If your college happens to have a Photography Club, join it only to find an excuse to spend time with your crush who might happen to be in it. They’ll just go for a handful of photowalks to Chandni Chowk, Agrasen ki Baoli, Old Fort and then passively compete with each other on their respective facebook photography pages.

And if you can’t make it into any of the clubs, I’d suggest you join AIESEC. I don’t know about work, but you’ll learn some dance steps in the name of “jive” which none of your non-AIESECers will give a shit about. You’ll have ample stories about who got with whom and be seen around Khan Market a lot.

And, if you decide to join none of them because time nahi hai, then congratulations, you’re already in the Society for Mutual Appreciation for Praveen Sharma and Ashish Kalra, while you worry for your upcoming CA exams.

Image Source: miraasjmi.wordpress.com