Ethos – an event for all non-toastmasters
Ethos, the annual birthday celebration, marks the jubilation of excellence for the toastmasters of Infosys Bhubaneswar Development Centre. Like every year, this year too, the event saw whole-hearted participation from the Development Centre (DC) fraternity including non-toastmasters.
Celebrated on 5th July, Ethos consisted of three events – Tall Tales, Table Topics (extempore) and Ad-Mads (maddening advertisements). The event was kick started by a keynote speech from DC-HR Manager Bobby Patnaik followed by inaugural speech from Club President Panchanan Mishra. Graced by the presence of senior DC leaders and members from HRD, the event also saw the presence of National award winning cinematographer Amartya Bhattacharyya as a guest. From the Toastmasters International leadership, Division L Director for District 41 Kaushik Bhattacharya and immediate past District Chief Judge DTM Saurabh Tripathi were also present during the event. The emcees for the day – Madhurima Chakraborty and Abhijat Pandey, pulled off a great show which was much appreciated by the audience. The contest anchors for Tall Tales (Debasish and Vikas); Table Topics (Avantika) and Ad-Mad (Annu) did a great job in coordinating the events and moderating their respective segments, helping the contestants feel at ease, many of whom were speaking in public for the first time.
While all of the speakers were winners in their own, the ones who stole the show were – Anurupa Ghosh – Winner Tall tales and Table Topics and Navina Sethi – winner Ad-Mad. Runner ups included Suchitra Mohanty, Shalini Dash and Siddhant Chowdhury, and Minati Mohanty. The event concluded with a thanksgiving speech from the club president followed by a grand cake cutting ceremony. The event was a success in terms of membership building as it helped in converting four of the guests to members, with many more to follow.