Litstock ’16: Extempore

It is said that public speaking is the art of diluting a two-minute idea with a two-hour vocabulary.

That is exactly what the participants of ‘Extempore’, organized by the incredibly piquant and enthralling members of the Literary, Debate and Quizzing Club, had to do. The event was held in AB5 and commenced shortly after 6.

The word extempore stems from the mid-16th century; in Latin ex tempore literally translates to ‘on the spur of the moment’. While it can barely be considered a task entailing plain-sailing, the participants managed to ‘Seas the Day’ quite formidably.

Owing to the present hustle involving club recruitments and sessional scares, the turn-up was quite poor, but that did not seem to deter either the intensely passionate participants or the organizers alike.

The preliminary round was called Block and Tackle where as per the coordinator’s wishes, the speaker had to refute the requisite argument and reinforce it alternatively, continually contradicting him/herself in order to contribute to the comedic element. From the ten people who had exhibited a genuine allure towards the bout, the first speaker to go up was Saurak Kulkarni.

The topic was, ‘There should be 6.9% reservation for girls in the mechanical stream’, an obvious jocular jab at the vacuum of female specimens in the mechanical department. Shouvik, a prominent member of the LDQ Committee gave the audience a taste of the intensity of the competition, and his performance was met with a tremendous uproar. Other extempore topics included ‘Pizza is the healthiest breakfast option’ and ‘Donald Trump should be the president of Mexico’.

The second round was called Shipwreck, where each of the four participants was assigned a prominent public figure such as Voldemort, Sherlock, Miley Cyrus and Narendra Modi. They were all aboard a ship which was about to sink but was only equipped with three lifeboats. Each had to justify why they should be provided a lifeboat instead of the other contenders.

The initial apprehension amongst the participants gradually died down, as they familiarized themselves with the flow of spontaneity. Three participants qualified for the final round, which was unparalleled when it came to being the most daunting of all- Hence Proved. In this round, the finalists had to correlate two very disparate subjects and the more unorthodox and erratic their method, the better. The topics, again, did not disappoint in creative fortitude. Apples are nothing but by-products of aliens to manipulate us. Narendra Modi, an unchallenged favourite of the evening, is the alter-ego of Batman.

The participants won full points for hilarity and having a good time, all culminating in an evening well-spent.

-Ananya Roy for MTTN