Usually a vibrant celebration of music, culture and campus energy, Delhi University’s fest season took a turbulent turn this year. Instead of headline performances and packed student crowds, the season became synonymous with viral videos of chaos — from brawls inside campuses to outsiders breaking gates and heavy police deployment struggling to maintain order.
At Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College last month, police had to resort to lathicharge as crowds attempted to force entry during a fest. Similar scenes played out this week at Hansraj College and Moti Lal Nehru College, where clashes broke out inside campuses while outsiders gathered and fought at entry points. As the season draws to a close, the disruptions have triggered a larger question — should artist performances at college fests be curtailed altogether?
Ban on artists? Principals split
Rama, the principal of Hansraj College, which witnessed a major brawl on campus last week, believes it may be time for strict measures. “There is a reason we do not want to allow an artist perfoming at our fests and It’s about time that DU curtails artiste performances at college fests otherwise such scenes will continue to happen,” she shared with us post the fest.
Hem Chand Jain, the Principal of Deen Dayal Upadhyay College, echoes a similar concern. His college saw significant chaos at the gates during Mohit Chauhan’s performance last month. “There is a very strong need for the university to have a centralized body that takes a decision on whether it is time for us to put a curb on bringing in artists to our fests, because that is the major reason behind all of this ruckus. As the college, we are aware of the downsides and always try to avoid having an artist perform. But then there is such pressure from student union and students that we have to end up with hosting one and it usually ends up in a messy situation. If a decision is passed by a centralized body, that college fests will not be allowed to host an artist performance, no one can then go against it. At our college, we have a capacity of around 10k students and on the day of our fest of Mohit Chauhan’s performance there were close to 60k students that were at the gates. We were lucky that there were no incidents of injuries etc. Even then because we wanted students to not return, we eventually made sure all the students got entry, but there was so much chaos with police having to control the situation which is never ideal and must not be repeated next year.”
{{/usCountry}}Hem Chand Jain, the Principal of Deen Dayal Upadhyay College, echoes a similar concern. His college saw significant chaos at the gates during Mohit Chauhan’s performance last month. “There is a very strong need for the university to have a centralized body that takes a decision on whether it is time for us to put a curb on bringing in artists to our fests, because that is the major reason behind all of this ruckus. As the college, we are aware of the downsides and always try to avoid having an artist perform. But then there is such pressure from student union and students that we have to end up with hosting one and it usually ends up in a messy situation. If a decision is passed by a centralized body, that college fests will not be allowed to host an artist performance, no one can then go against it. At our college, we have a capacity of around 10k students and on the day of our fest of Mohit Chauhan’s performance there were close to 60k students that were at the gates. We were lucky that there were no incidents of injuries etc. Even then because we wanted students to not return, we eventually made sure all the students got entry, but there was so much chaos with police having to control the situation which is never ideal and must not be repeated next year.”
{{/usCountry}}Better planning not bans
However, not all colleges agree that banning artist performances is the solution. Some believe the focus should instead be on better crowd management and stricter entry regulation. Vajala Ravi, Principal of Sri Venkateswara College, says, “Such evenings with an artist performing are important to give students a breathing space from academics. To avoid any situation that went out of control or overcrowding, we had a very strict system in place at the gates. On the day of the artist’s performance only Venky’s students were allowed. They had to show their student ID cards that had a security scanner on it which had all details of the students. We did have a situation where outsiders were trying to gain entry through duplicate cards, but the scanners were put in place for that only and we could regulate the entry properly through that,”
Similarly, Miranda House, which hosted singer Tulsi Kumar this year, reported a smooth and well-managed event. Principal Bijayalaxmi Nanda shares, “There are two important factors which we have adopted. One, the entry is only restricted to the students of Miranda. Two, which is important, is that we do not invite an artist that is overly too popular and would attract huge attention and crowd. Instead, we believe there needs to be a thought behind who we invite and it is usually an artist that goes with the ethos of the college like this year we has Tulsi who is herself an alumna of the university and of a girls college,”
Execution gaps fuel chaos
Event organisers say mismanagement at the planning stage often escalates the situation. Mayank Malik of Diego Events, which handled multiple DU fests this year, explains, “Student organisers tend to open registrations widely to make events bigger. When capacity becomes a concern, restrictions are imposed at the last minute, leading to overcrowding.” He also highlights safety lapses: “There have been injuries due to objects being thrown during performances. Strict frisking and controlled entry are essential going forward.”