Manipal: Mid-way through Revels ’16, the students of Manipal Institute of Technology (MIT), and the Student Council in particular, were in for a pleasant surprise. Just before the pro show began at the Quadrangle on Thursday, the founder of this great festival, Mr Vineet Kumar was invited to the stage by Dr G.K.Prabhu, Director, MIT. There was excitement as the person who started it all was right there telling them the Daastan, the story, of Revels.

Thousands of students who were present listened with rapt attention as Mr Vineet, a 1977-82 batch Mechanical Engineering student, drew deep from memory to portray how the festival came into existence. It was in 1982 that the first Revels was held. “We had planned it to be part of the silver jubilee celebrations. It was never expected to be a part of the MIT calendar from that year onwards. I am overwhelmed,” he said.

“When the dates for the Silver Jubilee were announced, a group of us thought we should come up with something. When we were together one night, it dawned on us to have a fest, but of course, only cultural events and not limited to just engineering colleges,” Mr Vineet said. He went on, “The idea was acceptable to all. So then we began racking our brains for the event”.

“Four days of fun and frolic. We had our pro shows every day and everything similar to what is happening today. The format hasn’t changed much, except that we did not have competitions in sports,” he said. So how did the festival get its name? “That’s interesting too,” Mr Vineet quipped. “The same group of students got down to suggesting names. They gave their suggestions and three or four among them had “Revel” in common”.

“So we decided to go with “Revel” as the MIT festival’s name. Soon all the printing work began and the programme was also printed. In it was a ‘printer’s devil’. Revel turned Revels, and the name stuck. That’s the Daastan of Revels. “Daastan --- Everybody has a story” is the tag line this year.