OLDEST BP DEBATE OF INDIA TAKES OFF FOR THE 15th YEAR

Ludhiana, February 2, 2024: The movie was the Great Debaters and a bunch at PCTE Group of Institutes, including a Faculty member and three students got inspired some 16 years back to the point where they began to read and research thoroughly about the rules of British Parliamentary Debate. They then went on to host one at their campus, and enjoyed it so much that they had to invite other teams to come and participate. Since then there has been no looking back. Two years later, Harpreet K Kang, who had initiated this move along with her three students, Arjun Sethi, Yatin Garg, and Japneet Singh pitched it to the Ludhiana Management Association, and they agreed to co-host. It was from there on named after the Late and Founding President of LMA, Dr. D R Memorial British Parliamentary Debate.

Thus was born a fierce and very competitive format of debating, which lasts day, night and the next day, and where teams from all over India and even Pakistan have come and engaged in rigorous discussions. This year about 40 teams from all over the country like Ramjas College, Hansraj College, RMNLU, Lucknow, Birla College, Karori Mal College, NIT Jalandhar, NIT, Kurukshetra, etc are competing in the 2 day long debate competition.

Kang, who is also the present and first Women President of Ludhiana Management Association said, “Debate is more engaging and compelling each time, since over the years more and more institutions are familiarised to the British Parliamentary debating pattern.” She added that since it is a knock out league, it is a lot of pressure on students to debate around the clock and keep performing.

Raghav Chaudhary, General Secretary, LMA offered an opinion that if a student is well read, and can communicate that knowledge, it is very unlikely that he or she can lose it here. Meanwhile, the New Chair of the Student’s Forum of LMA, Dr. Naresh Sachdev, who along with a team of 35 other faculty members is in rigorous adjudication panels observed that the interesting fact was that students were willing to come from far off places to gain an exposure, learn and grow over a series of 6 debate that each student will go through back to back, provided they reach the finals.

While the debates will continue way past midnight, the finals and semi-finals of the event will start tomorrow morning and it would be really exciting to see who wins the prestigious award, which also comes with cash prizes worth Rs. 1.5 lacs.