An innovative campus initiative to inspire creative expression

It was an innovative initiative for creating an ambience that inspires creative expression among students as a special ‘space’ has been carved out on the campus for promoting creativity.

The initiative of the Media Club of the Krishna Menon Memorial Government Women’s College here was, as the organisers claimed, the launch of a new campus culture that would stimulate creativity among the students of the college. At the centre of this initiative is a tree which has been re-christened as ‘Poetree’. Poems, stories and other literary works of students from colleges all over the country will be hanging from the tree near the open auditorium of the college.

“This imaginative initiative is a reflection of our desire for poetry to exist,” said Malayalam poet Veerankutty in his brief speech while inaugurating ‘Poetree’ on the college campus here on March 22. Before he recited a couple of his own poems on the occasion, he said that poetry was a safety valve for society. He also wrote a few lines of his own poem and hanged it on the tree as the students who gathered there flew wizard’s plumes (appooppan thadi) into the air to mark the auspicious occasion.

The effort of the Media Club, a joint venture of the college Departments of Journalism and English, was to inculcate in students a passion for creative expression, said club convener V.H. Nishad.

Entries of poems and stories that the club would mobilise would be changed weekly, he said adding that the students would be free to display their own creative expressions on the ‘Poetree’.

He said that the initiative had attained popularity as entries from a number of campuses were received. Students and young writers from Jawaharlal Nehru University, St. Stephen’s College, New Delhi, Shanthiniketan, West Bengal, Central University, Hyderabad, Madras University, Calicut University, Maharaja’s College, Kochi, Nehru Arts and Science College, Kanhangad, BCM College, Kottayam, Farook College, Kozhikode, University College, Thiruvananthapuram, Brennan College, Thalassery and other institutions sent their entries to be displayed on the tree.

College Principal K.V. Surendran presided over the function. Faculty members E.V. Fathima, Johny George and P.M. Ismail were among those who spoke at the function.