Every now and then, you encounter a story that has you completely astounded. Such was learning about this peculiar decades-old tradition at IIT Kanpur. Recently, an invitation card for Vedant and Utkarsh’s wedding ceremony at Hall 6, Basketball Court in IIT Kanpur, went viral on social media.
Did you know this fun fact about IIT Kanpur?😂
— Potato!🚩 (@Avoid_potato) May 4, 2024
So every year the students of last semester organise proper wedding of two boys,with all the ceremonies.
Interesting right?
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Scroll for their haldi mehndi and sangeet videos😭🙌😂 pic.twitter.com/Zyk4hW8V79
The tradition is called ‘Hall-1 Ki Baaraat‘ where two students, dressed as a groom and a bride, get married, except it is not a real wedding. Shruti Hansika, an IIT Kanpur student and digital creator, shared a thorough glimpse of this year’s ceremonies, including mehendi, haldi, and baaraat.
Take a look –
When we say, this thing is seriously unserious, we mean it. There’s an actual mare for baaraat, relatives, dance, celebration, and pandits chanting mantras (howsoever ridiculous they may sound).
But this story is not all that it seems because there’s the bride’s lover Satender with his gang of goons who barge into the ceremony, and there’s no guarantee that the wedding will even take place or who’s gonna marry whom.
So, basically, the entire affair is nothing short of a Bollywood masala, perhaps with a better script. Writing about this uncanny tradition, Hansika wrote it’s been originated as a way for the students ‘to celebrate the end of their time at the institute’. Two guys from Hall 1, a senior UG hostel for all graduating students, marry each other. The bride gets dressed by the girls in Hall-6, girl’s hostel. The baaraat travels all the way from Hall 1 to Hall 6, while the ceremony takes place in the Basketball court, as a host of residents unite to celebrate the couple.
Describing this tradition, the IIT Kanpur website notes, “The event depicts the freedom & dignity of mind which IITians have, the culture where there is no discrimination may be its caste, race, religion or sex.”
Unsurprisingly, the Internet is very amused by this. Watching the celebration, some are even craving for the campus life they never lived –
Who wouldn’t want to be a part of this? From the outside, when one thinks of IIT, one thinks of students being constantly bombarded with academic pressure. At least that’s what the dominating perspective is. Then you watch stories like these, and they convey a different story. But when did ‘Hall-1 Ki Baaraat’, as a tradition, begin? Only knowing the origin story will give us peace now.
