With the fest just around the corner, the APOGEE English Press sat down with Harishankar Padmakumar, the fest coordinator for the Poetry Club, to gain an understanding of their preparations for the upcoming fest.

According to Harishankar, the Poetry Club represents a collective of poetry and literature enthusiasts on campus. It has actively tried to keep the culture of reading and writing literature on campus alive, focused, but not limited to, poetry.

For APOGEE ’25, the Poetry Club has organised Conspiring Minds—an escape room-themed quiz event, and Chaupaal—a congregation of Hindi-Urdu poets from across the country, wherein they perform their best pieces in front of an audience and discuss the finer aspects of their poetry. While Chaupaal has been a legacy event of the Poetry Club which has aimed to rekindle the spirit of Hindi-Urdu poetry among its attendees, Conspiring Minds has been a rather unique event, focused on trivia and logic infused with a poetic touch. He added that Conspiring Minds had served as a medium to increase engagement and bonding among the first-year members of the club, as most of the work related to the event had been done by them. It had been designed to be a fun experience for all attendees who wished to have a fun time during the fest, by engaging in a battle of logic and presence of mind.

Harishankar explained that the pitching process for Conspiring Minds had been rather smooth, however, the prize money had been reduced significantly. The club also had some friction with CoStAA about the budget and finances with regards to Chaupaal. He elaborated that the funds used for logistics and miscellaneous purposes, that is, other than the payments made to the poets, had been difficult to secure. He added that another legacy event of the club—Poetry Slam—had been cancelled by CoStAA at the last moment due to lack of funds, despite being the face of spoken-word poetry among literature enthusiasts on campus for many years. This major setback, along with the budget cuts, had adversely affected the club. However, he added, they had managed to work with the allocated funds and would conduct the remaining events to the best of their abilities.

The preparations for APOGEE had begun 2–3 weeks before the fest. A major task had been reaching out to poets for Chaupaal. This had been accomplished through two channels—noted poetry foundations such as Rekhta, and the club’s network of poets that had been built over the years through these events. Other pre-fest work had included brainstorming over the format and rules for Conspiring Minds, which changed every year. Most of the preparations were completed, with finishing touches remaining to be added.

Harishankar said that being the coordinator for the Poetry Club had been a very enriching experience for him. He noted that his interactions with the coordinators for other clubs and departments had been smooth and prompt.

Harishankar expressed his concern about some aspects of CoStAA’s working—specifically the scheduling of meetings. He remarked that the budget meeting for APOGEE had been scheduled much later than usual—after all the forms encompassing travel, accommodation and logistics had been completed. Due to the late budget confirmation, the members had faced difficulty in coordinating with the external organizations involved in the club’s events, which in turn caused a late confirmation of their participation in the same.

The Poetry Club’s visibility among BITSians had been a cause of concern among members of the clubs for a long time. Harishankar remarked that despite having organized multiple major events with tremendous footfall, such as Rap Wars during Oasis, very few people had known the club and the workforce behind them. He further said that the club has planned to organize more events, such as open mics, during the non-fest periods in order to increase the club’s visibility and awareness among people.

Harishankar concluded by advising all students on campus to attend the Poetry Club’s events during APOGEE, and remarked that they would be enjoyable for everyone.