Panjab University zonal youth and heritage fest to be held after final exams

The authorities are planning to conduct the youth and heritage festival after final exams in February 2021. Only solo events will be organised during the fest to ensure social distancing.

This decision was taken up in a meeting held between the PU youth welfare director Nirmal Jaura and principals of Zone B at Ramgarhia Girls College on Tuesday. Keeping in view the Covid pandemic, the fest will be held only for the participants.

In the meeting, the principals of girls’ colleges suggested that instead of four days, the fest can be organised for a week so that the Covid-19 protocol is followed.

Earlier, there was only one venue for the PU youth festival but this time it has been decided to conduct the fest at two colleges.

Jaura said, “Both the colleges are centrally located and have auditoriums and open spaces to conduct the events. For Zone A, the competitions will be conducted at Satish Chander Dhawan (SCD) Government

College. The dates of the event will be finalized later on, keeping in mind the coronavirus situation.”

For Zone B colleges, the event will be held in Khalsa College for Women, Civil Lines, which will be the nodal college. Few competitions will be organized at Government College for Girls.

In 2014, the varsity had introduced a reservation of one additional seat for a zonal, inter-zonal, or national-level youth fest winner and a weightage of 1-3% for participants taking admission in PU-affiliated colleges.

Amrita Singla, a student of Government College for Girls, said, “This is my last year in the college and I was very excited to participate in the youth fest. But due to Covid-19, colleges got closed and we switched to online classes. The authorities had earlier decided not to conduct the festival. This move will help me give my last performance here.”