Pravega 2014: Students mesmerise the audience in Science Slam event

Swissnex Science Slam, sponsored by Swissnex, with the promise of Swiss chocolates, Swiss watches, Swiss bags, Swiss universities whew! That is a lot of Swiss, but who does not like Swiss goodies? The organisers had displayed some level of cunning on their part when they decreed that participants would have to present their research within 3 minutes in the form of a stage performance. Where is the fun in a good old paper presentation, huh? The esteemed jury consisted of the CEO of Swissnex, Professor S.V. Shankaran from IEEE. With complete freedom of expression, be it poetry, drama or dance, the event promised to be a sure entertainer and boy, was it one! More than twenty participants took part in this novel competition, probably the first of its kind in India.

Some came in groups, while others resorted to all sorts of eye-catching ways on their own to keep the crowd on their feet. Sanjitha Sharma from IISc actually made her presentation on the dung of male Asian elephants, which are known as bulls, as the speaker was careful to remind us - the piece being a poem playfully titled "Bullshit". Jay Bakshi did a rap rendition of ‘radiation hardening of ICs' .The stakes were high: with the first prize being a trip to a Swiss university, the participant who wooed us best was Megha (KSIT) with a dance- drama on ‘Cost- effective procedures for electrooculograms', which duly bagged the first prize.

Next up for grabs was a Swatch watch which was taken by the team from DESE, IISc for their puppet show on ‘Crowd Sensing for Wildlife Conservation'. The third prize, a Swiss military bag full of goodies, went to Harisharan and Co. for their group mime on ‘2D Speech Analysis'. The event surprised us with participants full of joie de vivre despite popular claims that they would be nerds. The other participants returned happy with free chocolates and other goodies. Well, it was a science slam alright.