The seventh annual TEDxBITSPilani event kicked off at 2 PM on Sunday, February 13th, 2022. The anchors, Shreyansh and Shivika, started by showing a quick video explaining the difference between TED and TEDx events; i.e. TEDx events are independently organised.

The theme for the event was SwitchBack, and the speakers were invited to talk about all the detours and pitfalls they encountered on their paths to success, and the lessons they learnt. In other words, to ‘SwitchBack’ onto their journeys.

Cyrus Todiwala 

Cyrus Todiwala is a world-renowned chef who has played a vital role in popularising Indian cuisine internationally. He began by talking about the importance of ideas in creating anything, and how a simple idea can have a lasting impact on people all over the world. He gave the example of the Dutch East India Company and how India used to act as the trough of spice production for the world. He explained how Italy was dominating the spice market in Europe by trading with the Arabs, and how other European countries were desperate to find India so they could break this monopoly.

He further spoke about how the Portuguese became masters of using vinegar that was produced from spoiled wine brought on ships, and how it was used for pickling and preserving meats. Cyrus explained that this preserved meat was an essential source of nutrition for sailors, and was one of the reasons Vasco de Gama was able to travel to India, find Kerala, and establish one of the first links of the East with the West.

He believes that spices—and food, in general—played a vital role in bringing about globalisation. He said that this is evident when we compare how we eat our food today, and how we ate a few hundred years ago – we’ve incorporated other cultures into our own as we have with cuisine. 

Akshay Chopra

Akshay Chopra is a fitness and nutrition consultant. An NDA graduate, he is a former Indian Air Force pilot, and captain of the Air Force Bodybuilding team. He began by talking about the reason he started training—his genes. His grandfather was a former wrestler, and his mother was a national award-winning athlete. He revealed that he was labelled “worthless” because he was more interested in the field and the stage than the classroom during his childhood. He was an enthusiastic reader and, according to him, it was this quality that helped him crack the NDA exam in his first attempt.

It was through his bodybuilding journey that he realised that there was a lack of a research and evidence-based approach to fitness and nutrition in India. He studied strength, conditioning, nutrition and supplementation, and completed many certifications in these areas. He has written numerous books, lectured all around the country, opened gyms, and built an online brand.

He concluded by emphasising the importance of going into the depth of a subject, using fitness as a tool to discover yourself, doing your own research, and living life on your own terms. He says that his love for fitness has only increased throughout his journey, and that he is still as curious, if not more, as he used to be.

Kriti Tula

Kriti Tula is an apparel designer and the co-founder of Doodlage, a sustainable fashion label. She started her journey with sustainable fashion in 2012, and aims to create India’s first global, sustainable, and affordable fashion brand, focusing on reselling, repairing, and upcycling. Kriti began her talk by describing her journey in the fashion industry, from learning garment and pattern making, to designing for purpose and function.

Kriti talked about how, after graduating from the London School of Fashion, she worked with various designer labels and export houses—where she learned about the fashion industry—and started to notice that there was something gravely wrong with how things were done. As she discovered more about how globalisation led to fast fashion and the poor working conditions of bottom line workers, Kriti realised that she had to find an alternative. Her team started finding ways to reduce waste at the design stage by working with creative embroideries such as panelling, and patching over defects to optimise waste.

To further their effort to create a sustainable fashion label, Doodlage also partners with NGOs and social enterprise organisations that work towards artisan upliftment and cleaner energy. Besides this, they work with pre-dyed recycled materials, and any waste they produce is shredded to make paper for packaging. They leave excess margins in all the garments they create, so as to allow consumers to connect back with them at a later stage to alter their clothing and increase its life.

Sai Shravanam

Sai Shravanam talked about how, as a child, he was always inclined towards the beauty of sound. He was encouraged to pursue music in school, and started playing the tabla, listening to recordings of Ustad Zakir Hussain. After completing a postgraduate degree in Computer Science and a brief stint as a project associate in IIT Madras, he decided to pursue his calling for music and sound, and set up his own studio.

Sai elaborated on some important qualities to follow in order to pursue one’s passion. These include the need to recognize and embrace, seek and discover, take risk and experiment, maintain commitment, and seek excellence.

Sai went on to talk about the challenges faced when recording an artist in a studio. The studio is a closed off, clinical environment, and he used to wonder what he could do to make the artist feel comfortable. He started going outside and recording in an environment that was conducive to the instrument. In the last twenty years of recording music, he realised that it is not merely the technology that one has to understand, but the art form, artist, and passion as well.

Jeroo Billimoria

Jeroo Billimoria is a social entrepreneur, and the founder of Childline India Foundation, a 24-hour emergency telephone service for children. She is also the founder of Child and Youth Finance International (CYFI) and Aflatoun, two organisations that are facilitating meaningful change in the financial inclusion of the youth. Childline has over a thousand core partners and a child protection ecosystem. Elaborating on this, Jeroo spoke about the power and importance of collaboration, whether it be with the government, with civil society, or with other NGOs.

In collaboration with a large group of social entrepreneurs, Jeroo is also one of the founding members of the Catalyst 2030 movement, which aims at accelerating the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals by 2030, and working toward changing systems at all levels. She talked about how, with Catalyst, she had been able to impact the lives of more people than she could have done individually. 

Jeroo talked about how Catalyst had started with a Whatsapp group of around fifty members, and has today grown into a network of over a thousand people from across the world. These members include both young people who are starting enterprises, and older people coaching them. Jeroo concluded that because they had kept collaboration and innovation at the core of their beliefs, Catalyst now has social entrepreneurs, academics, foundations, and corporations willing to join them.