Seriously, people. This is no laughing matter!

At least that’s what one of my former students told me at Tata-Dhan Academy’s third convocation, during which I got to dress up in a very white shirt and a long white dhoti.

The convocation was an interesting event. It was organized on pretty short notice, but it was still very well attended by the local community. It was also a little bit of an adventure. Just around lunchtime, when we were doing our final rehearsal walk, it suddenly started pouring, and the heavy wet cotton tent covering the seating area soon blew over and collapsed–while we were in there!

Where are ACEDRR or DAMN It! when you need them?

As soon as the rain let up and we had finished eating, it was “disaster response” time. We decided to ditch the tent cover (we had clouds blocking the sun anyway, so it wasn’t super hot) which meant that most of the graduating students had to be put to work. Seriously… we make them work hard for this degree!

Like I said, don't smile! (Or maybe they are so tired because they had to do a lot of disaster relief work in a short period of time.)

Near disaster aside, the rest of the day went quite smoothly. India’s Chief Election Commissioner was our guest at the event and he gave quite a good speech about the different ways in which our graduates can help promote democracy in India by ensuring that people are registered to vote and so on.

Are they smiling? Some people don't listen to instructions.

And, of course, it was great to see many of my former students in one place together….

Here’s an article about some of the things that Navin B Chawla had to say at our convocation.