Arts management

Core member, IISER Mohali SPIC MACAY Heritage Club (Sep 2022 - Apr 2025)

During the course of my association with the SPIC MACAY Heritage Club at IISER Mohali for almost three years, I organized and anchored as many as 20 cultural programs and lecture demonstrations, hosting over 50 artists including SPIC MACAY’s flagship event ’Virasat’ during the years 2023, 2024 and 2025. Besides organizing and participating in several cultural programs, I also helped in the growth of SPIC MACAY Heritage Club of IISER Mohali by recruiting and mentoring several volunteers. During my time, I hosted the following artists:

1. Dr Kiran Seth - founder, SPIC MACAY (Sep 2022)

2. Mohiniyattam by Rekha Raju (Oct 2022)

3. Manipuri by Ivana Sarkar (Nov 2022)

4. Bharatanatyam by Shivaranjani Harish (Dec 2022, compèred)

5. Madhubani painting workshop by Smt Ambika Devi (Mar 2023)

6. Sitar by Ustad Shahid Parvez (Mar 2023, compèred)

7. Carnatic vocal by S Sowmya and troupe (March 2023, compèred)

8. Kathak by Rajendra Gangani (March 2023, compèred)

9. Yoga workshop by Sanyasi Premananda (Feb 2024)

10. Rudraveena by Bahauddin Dagar and troupe (Feb 2024, compèred)

11. Hindustani vocal by Sajan Mishra (Feb 2024)

12. Carnatic violin by Lalgudi siblings and troupe (Feb 2024, compèred)

13. Odissi by Sujata Mohapatra and troupe (Feb 2024, compèred)

14. Sufiyana Qawwali by Shahid Sami Niyazi and troupe (Sep 2024)

15. Mohiniyattam by Renjini KP and troupe (Nov 2024)

16. Dhrupad workshop by Pandit Ritvik Sanyal (Feb 2025)

17. Carnatic mandolin by U Nagamani and troupe (Feb 2025)

18. Hindustani vocal by Ulhas Kashalkar and troupe (Feb 2025)

19. Bharatanatyam by Geeta Chandran and troupe (Feb 2025)

20. Kuchipudi by T Lakshmi Reddy and troupe (Apr 2025, compèred)

Cultural Secretary, IISER Mohali (Nov 2022 - Sep 2023)

I was elected as the Cultural Secretary in the Student Representative Council at IISER Mohali just post the COVID-19 pandemic to serve the student community comprising 1000+ members. As a result of this, my primary task was to revive student club and cultural activities that had gone dormant due to the pandemic. This included overseeing club activities and conducting multiple cultural programs by leading 20 clubs and their volunteers. I was also instrumental in converting paper-based communications between the students an admin to electronic means. During my time, I collaborated with IISER Mohali's office of International Relations and Outreach to conduct 10+ events under the banner of Gender Advancement for Transforming Institutions (GATI), an initiative of the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India to promote gender equity in STEM. The events included talks, workshops and panel discussions. 

Arts management intern, Aalaap (Nov 2020 - Feb 2021)

I worked at Aalaap, a Chennai-based boutique event management company for classical arts, with founder Akhila Krishnamurthy. During my four months with Aalaap, I ran social media campaigns for multiple senior Bharathanatyam dancers, was part of the social media team for 'Yours Truly Margazhi' (Chennai's December Music and Dance festival online due to the COVID-19 pandemic) and hosted several online discussions. Below is a comprehensive list of the projects I worked on.

1.  Aalaap's Margazhi jumble 2020 - Along with my sister Vibha, we curated a crossword each of the 31 days of the Tamil month Margazhi, that coincides with the music and dance festival in Chennai. 

2. Episodes 14 - 20 of Sweat it Out (one hour online workshop for dancers during the pandemic) - ran social media publicity, coordinated with the artist and ran the online workshops.

3. Yours Truly Margazhi 2020 - In lieu of the COVID-19 pandemic, many of the sabhas in Chennai came together to conduct a joint, online music and dance festival. I was part of the team that ran the social media campaign for this month-long event and alos created content leading upto the festival. 

4. Ragam Saree Natyam - This was a 5 day pre-event to Yours Truly Margazhi, for which I curated the content and ran the social media campaign.

5. Khitchdi Kesari Coffee - A month-long Instagram live conversation series that featured two artists a day. I was in-charge of the social media for this series, coordinated with artistes and ensured smooth progression of the event.

6. Hum-Drum - Collated videos of different musicians creating a jingle, a pre-event leading upto Yours Truly Margazhi. You can find my version of the jingle here.

7. First Look - part of Aalaap's team that organized First Look, a display of solo dance productions that were created during the pandemic. I was involved in conducting pre-events, ticket sales, social media campaign and streaming of the event.

8. I was part of the social media campaign team for Anitha Guha's Bharathanjali's 30th anniversary, Madurai R Muralidaran's 50 Jathi Challenge, Aravinth Kumarasamy and Apasaras Arts' Amara and Lakshmi Parthasarathy Athreya's Varanam Ayiram.

Cultural Secretary, Vidya Mandir Senior Secondary School (Jun 2018 - Jan 2020)

I was selected from a batch of 100+ students to serve as Assistant Cultural Secretary (2018-2019) and then Cultural Secretary (2019-2020). During my tenure apart from overseeing cultural activities I was also part of the group of prefects who trained middle school students in drill sessions and high school students in march past activities. I led large teams of students (>50) to participate in inter-school cultural competitions spanning arts, fine arts, literary and speaking events. My team were victorious in multiple of these events and we won overall at Sishyamrita (Sishya school), Scintillations (PS Senior Secondary School), Kalanjali (Bala Vidya Mandir) and Reverberations (Padma Seshadri Bala Bhavan). I was also part of the organizing committee for Reflections, Vidya Mandir's inter-school cultural festival for two consecutive years.