How Could I Say 'I Love You'..........Part 4

"And now" the anchor stopped for a couple of seconds and looked all around the hall before continuing "the most exciting competition of the evening, the winner of which will get a wrist watch worth Rs. 1000. " There was a huge applause from my peers in the front rows. For me, though, it was another precious time loss. I was already feeling hungry and wanted to leave the auditorium as soon as the announcement of dinner is made. This 'exciting competition' would definitely delay the proceedings by another 15 minutes at least. I had begun to get irritated but, on the contrary, my batchmates were pretty excited.

"So, who wish to participate in this competition?", the anchor asked. A lot of hands shot up in the air. "If I tell you that in this particular competition the participants have to speak for 2 minutes on a random but pretty interesting topic given by us, then how many of you will participate?" Within next 2 seconds only few hands were visible in the air. Most of them were seasoned debaters or speakers and didn't have the stage phobia.

"As I had expected" the anchor chuckled "only few are really interested in this competition since one has to speak ad-lib . But if the seasoned debaters participate in it then there won't be any fun and we do not want to make this event devoid of any zing. So we have already prepared a list of selected students, of course, through a lucky draw, who will participate in this competition. There will be 5 persons competing for the watch and the list is in my hand."

There was a huge cheering from the juniors' row while seniors just clapped. Most of them would have definitely become anxious after the announcement. Within this mixed atmosphere of anxiousness and excitement, the anchor read out the 1st name - Dilip Talwar and his topic 'Studies = One night fight'. The announcement of his name and topic resulted in a bout of laughter among all of us. Even I couldn't suppress my laughter. The reason was pretty obvious - Dilip's nickname in the college was One Night Fight since he always studied a day before the exam. How he managed to pass all these 3 years was a mystery to many. Anyway, he climbed the stage very confidently and spoke for 3 minutes instead of stipulated 2.