With Oasis right around the corner, the Oasis English Press interviewed Roshan Raj, the Coordinator of the Association of Rock, BITS Pilani (ARBITS), to learn more about the club’s contributions to the fest.

Roshan explained that the club conducted Rocktaves, a kernel event that garnered participation from semi-professional bands across India. This year, the event would be headlined by the Anand Bhaskar Collective, a Delhi-based band known for their Hindi rock music. Roshan shared a poignant memory of listening to the band while preparing for his Joint Entrance Examination, and was looking forward to seeing the band perform live. He also revealed that the event would be judged by Parikrama, one of Asia’s biggest rock groups. He highlighted that the group shared a special bond with BITS and Oasis, having won Rocktaves in 1992. The band credited Rocktaves as the turning point in their career, and wanted to headline this year but would now judge the finals, he added. 

Apart from this, ARBITS would also conduct Indie Nite, Jazz Nite and Hip-Hop After Party — events that gave smaller artists a stage to perform. He revealed that this year, Soul Sundae will perform for Jazz Nite, while Indie Nite would feature acts like The Yellow Diary and Sahil Gulati. 

The club started its preparatory work over the summer break, which involved tasks like contacting bands and judges, conducting preliminary rounds for Rocktaves, arranging travel and accommodation for winners and judges, negotiating quotes for the headlining act, and coordinating with the StuCCA and other departments.

When asked about the challenges they had been facing, Roshan mentioned that the uncertainty of whether Oasis was going to happen or not resulted in the preliminary rounds being postponed twice. This caused a lot of bands to lose patience, with some even backing out of the event. He added that they also faced issues regarding payments to venues and judges, which were handled well by the Corroboration and Review Committee and the StuCCAn, Finance.

Speaking of his experience as the Coordinator, Roshan noted that though it was more hectic than he expected, he was glad to have the opportunity to work on his favourite event, Rocktaves. He added that he would miss working for the fest and that it would ‘leave a hole in his heart’. He remarked that working and collaborating with juniors was a great experience, and the StuCCA was helpful and collaborative.

Roshan encouraged all BITSians to attend Rocktaves — a legacy event for BITS that is close to all of their hearts — and other events like Jazz Nite, supporting the talented and passionate bands who come from all over India to this small village to perform for them.