The Oasis English Press (OEP) sat down for an oily snack at the Institute Canteen with Tanvi Gangakhedkar and Ansh Gupta (who go by multiple names, including but not limited to: Big T and Big A, Triple T and Ansh Rasgulla, Tanvi Thepla and Ansh Fafda), the Coordinators of the Association of Rock, BITS, colloquially known as ARBITS.
Addressing a ‘common’ misconception, Ansh clarified that ARBITS was not the club that organised Batch Snaps. Neither did it stand for ‘Alumni Relations, BITS’, nor did it have anything to do with the Civil Engineering Department of BITS. Historically, however, ARBITS (being an association of passionate rock collectors) was linked to the now-defunct Metallurgy Department of BITS. Unfortunately, due to budgetary constraints, the Metallurgy Department was ‘yeeted out’, but ARBITS remained. Over the years, the association’s association with rocks wore down, and it instead metamorphosed into a collective of music enthusiasts. In Big A’s own words, ARBITS is a ‘group of pretentious dudes who think they are cool, but then they’re just losers’.
When asked about what ARBITS ‘actually did’, Big T answered that they ran a pretentious WhatsApp group called ‘Rock Exchange’, which initially started off as a group where people could trade cool rocks, but most of the joinees instantly misunderstood its purpose and started sharing their favorite music instead. Now, it is riddled with people from all over the campus attempting to ‘out-niche’ each other or ‘farm’ for heart reactions to get validation, she sighed while expressing sadness over not receiving enough on a Jamiroquai song she had shared on the group earlier that day. She then went on to boldly claim, ‘I don’t post there to farm for likes, I do it for the love of the game.’ Big A chimed in that he had only ever shared a song on the group once (Dead Souls by Joy Division), before giving a shoutout to two people: one named after an Indian superhero, and the other after an Indonesian province, who happened to be the only ones that liked the song. The OEP would like to clarify that we have never heard of this artist or song.
When further pestered about what ARBITS ‘actually actually did’, Tanvi gave in and revealed that they were responsible for organising Rocktaves, which was one of India’s largest semi-professional battle-of-the-bands competition, and the oldest of its kind. Rocktaves, she explained, was a launchpad for budding bands and artists, with many previous winners (notably Indian Ocean and Parikrama) having made it big afterwards. Winning Rocktaves carried a cash prize of up to one lakh rupees, in addition to the bragging rights.
The interviewer (in a personal capacity) expressed admiration for the club, for keeping ‘real music’ alive and honouring the legacy of rock legends like The Doors, Soundgarden and more. Her adulation, however, was short lived, as Ansh then began listing out names of members (LarPSC, Gopalan, Aditya, Ravikumar, Vaishnav, Miniso and Khursi Mehta) who did not listen to rock music in particular, highlighting that this wasn’t a criteria for recruitment. This argument was further solidified by Tanvi mentioning the various geographical ‘quotas’ that existed, such as those for people from Puri, Odisha and Kalyan, Maharashtra.
The OEP has independently verified that none of the above mentioned people are part of ARBITS.
The Coordinators then treated the OEP to a heated argument between themselves over which Indian state they disliked the most, with the two states in contention being Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh. This fight, eventually, ended in a stalemate, with both parties agreeing that Gujarat was undoubtedly the worst.
The OEP would like to state on record that these are the personal views of Tanvi Thepla and Ansh Fafda, and in no way do they reflect the views of the Press. The OEP would also like to condemn the hateful tirade the good people of Gujarat have been subjected to by the two despite themselves being named after Gujarati dishes.
The conversation eventually circled back to organising Rocktaves, for which Ansh explained that prelims were held in multiple cities across the country, including Mumbai, Pune, Chennai, Delhi, Kolkata and Bangalore, while expressing his love for Bengali people. Triple T appreciated bands turning up for prelims in Delhi, Kolkata, and Bangalore, all of which had fairly high turnout.
Quashing popular rumours that Drake was to headline Rocktaves 2026, the Coordinators shared that the main acts for this edition would be Alchemy and Mukt, continuing the two headliner tradition since last year’s Rocktaves, since Drake had backed out at the last minute due to personal reasons. Quoting Big A: ‘Mukt is a very interesting band, since they take Urdu and Hindi literature from a time period in history and compose songs based on that literature, so every song has a story.’ Alchemy, the other headliner, composed ‘Indie Rock Pop Jazz Rock Fusion’ music.
Ansh and Tanvi then started fighting about what they would name their two-piece band if they ever came to forming one. This squabble led to nothing, with neither of them willing to settle for any name proposed by the other person. The conversation then drifted to Vietnamese surnames and how Ansh was a ‘spiritually Vietnamese girl dad’.
The OEP interviewer, with her patience already exhausted, asked them for their closing remarks, and whether they had anything to say for freshers in BITS attending their very first Rocktaves. Ansh remarked that now, Rocktaves was more about the headliners and no longer about the participants, which was a shame since the participating bands were all incredible in their own right, and that the point of the competition had always been to introduce people in the college to these talented, burgeoning indie bands. Tanvi added that unlike all other events in Oasis, Rocktaves was completely free to attend. The two urged freshers to stick around for the competition part, and not leave after the headliners were done performing, as a night of incredible music featuring the finalists (SoHumble, Mazaar, Fatdog, Blast Beat to Death, EQS, Fort in Flames, and Kastoor) awaited.