Ashoka University held its first Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Expo on Wednesday, 25 September, 2024, on the occasion of SDG Flag Day. The Expo, conducted by the Office of Sustainability (OOS), aimed to showcase Ashokans working towards sustainability. There were interactive activities, clothes drives, the sale of stationery and sustainable items, and presentations of research findings. The event attracted students and faculty alike in large numbers.
This is the OOS’s first event, and Kyra Chhetri (UG’26), an intern with the office, said they were “only expecting 50 to 60 people.” However, footfall turned out to be much higher, to the satisfaction of the Organising Committee (OC).
A notable feature of the Expo was the ‘Tree of Hope', an installation piece that utilised a repotted dying tree procured from the Horticulture Department. Attendees were encouraged to write down their hopes for sustainability on paper leaves handmade by the OC out of recycled paper. “It’s a metaphor,” Chhetri explained. “You fill the tree with hopeful messages, and fill the planet with hopeful initiatives.”
Each stall was assigned one SDG. Organisations like Ruhi, Rotaract, Ashoka Centre for Well-Being (ACWB), and the Environment Ministry were invited to put up stalls. In an interdisciplinary display Imroze Khan, Associate Professor of Biology and Divya Karnad, Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies, and a couple Young India Fellows, among others, fronted stalls promoting their individual research on horticulture, justice and institutions, climate action, and marine biology, in line with UN SDGs.
Aspects of the event, however, attracted criticism from the student body. For instance, attendees could enter a raffle by visiting and receiving stamps from all 17 stalls at the Expo. This ‘reward-based system’ for attending the event was criticised by a stall host, who complained that people were coming to her stall simply to receive the stamp without listening to what she had to say. She questioned whether or not this competitive incentivisation to attend all stalls took away from the ethos of the Expo itself.
In response, Mitul Baruah, Head of the Department of Environmental Studies, Ashoka University, stated that a university campus is always bustling with events and attracting the community through incentives is not a bad thing, “as long as the incentives lead to some meaningful engagement.”
The SDG 2 (Zero Hunger) stall was occupied by Channel 9, a bakery selling slices of cake for Rs. 200, which many expressed was unaffordable. The OOS would have preferred a student organisation to occupy the stall, says Dr. Rajni Kaushik, Assistant Director, Sustainability, Ashoka University, who chairs the new OOS. The student organisation they reached out to was allegedly busy with other commitments.
The office will continue implementing changes on campus over the coming years. These include water audits, the implementation of EV bus options, and the expansion of solar panels.
Baruah maintains that the Expo was a success, and more events like this are needed on campus. Further, he says more resources have to be allocated for the OOS to make real change. Kaushik says that “this is now being considered and will happen in the coming year.”
(Edited by Hiyaneijemmy Das and Keerthana Panchanathan)
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