Editorial Board
Editor-In-Chief : Nanditha Krishna
“Creativity takes courage.”
– Henri Matisse
It is a matter of a great honour and immense pleasure for me to have been able to be take on the position and role of Editor-In-Chief for ĀROH. We embarked on the journey of materializing an E-Magazine in the first month of 2021,with no direction as to how to navigate through this journey. The prospect of an E-magazine seemed impossible at first. We needed graphic designing resources, an Editorial board, a Creative concept team for the layout of the magazine etc. With help from the Editorial Board and the Design team headed by Arundathi, visualizing the magazine became possible. Arundathi and I paired up for the Creative concept for ĀROH. We brainstormed visual elements, spacing, sequence, typography, ideas for the layout of the E-Magazine. The Graphics team has spared no efforts and strived so hard on designing the entire magazine. With careful, extremely detailed and thorough and diligent efforts from the Editorial Board, editing 90+ written submissions too became accomplishable. “Creativity takes courage” said Henri Matisse. The same holds good for this creative initiative and endeavour. The three months post January have been spent towards days and nights of brainstorming, painstaking mind-mapping, planning, sorting 150+ e-mail submissions (both written and artistic) and assigning and allotting them to editors, designing and the art works, conducting polls for magazine and this way, the entire team has been instrumental and successful in bringing these ideas to reality. The magazine that we have today is a result of the perseverance and meticulous efforts over the last 3 months. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Arun Sir without whom this project would not have been possible. I take this opportunity to thank him for always mentoring us throughout the journey, suggesting creative ideas and for always inspiring and believing in us and pushing us to do better. ĀROH is a Sanskrit word which means progress, rise, prosperity and advancement. We have extended this idea to materialize design of the e-magazine. AROH has five sections, each representing a season. Each season represents progress that is inevitable. Arohana or Aroha, in the context of Indian classical music is the ascending scale of notes in a raga. Like the Arohana in Carnatic music, we rise, we prosper, advance through difficulties to make progress. Starting with the Grīṣmaḥ, and ending in Vasantaḥ AROH will represent each and every student of Semester-4 Integrated M.A English Language and Literature students of Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Amritapuri and their musings about life. We have incorporated a similar idea for the front cover of AROH. The great Himalayan Range, important for ecology, climate, hydrology, geology and culture, embody the apex of progress that we can achieve, and to us, this magazine is one step closer to the great journey of life to reach the top. AROH reflects prosperity, positive change and advancement and we hope this magazine will be a way for you, the readers to see our class from a new perspective as every submission represents diversity, love, compassion, empathy, intellectual humility, emotional depth, resilience, and deep awareness and cogitation about life.
–Nanditha Krishna
Chief Graphics Head : Arundathi Krishna
Every second is different when compared to the previous one. Each day is progress and an opportunity to better ourselves. “Nothing is so painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change,” wrote Mary Shelly in Frankenstein. But change, for better or for worse, is inevitable. This inevitable change is the inspiration of ĀROH. ĀROH showcases the life of the students of Semester 4 Integrated MA English Language and Literature. Even though we are stuck at home due to the pandemic, the feeling of hope and prosperity is still alive within us, and this can be seen inside the magazine. The duty I was given was designing the whole magazine. Even though it seemed like a Herculean task when Arun Sir introduced it for the first time in our Technical and Professional Writing class, my wonderful team of designers and illustrators helped in making the journey easier for me. ĀROH provided me with an opportunity to learn many new things. Each mistake I made was rectified and each good work was appreciated by the Chief editor Nanditha Krishna. The three months of designing and working with them taught me many lessons of patience and perseverance. With the front cover of the magazine showcasing the Great Himalayan Ranges which is the epitome of grandness and the pages starting with the hot summer months and ending in beautiful spring, ĀROH will represent each and every student of Semester-4 Integrated M.A English Language and Literature students of Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Amritapuri and their musings about life. ĀROH has their life and musings in the form of words and paintings. I hope the readers enjoy it as much as we enjoyed making it.
–Arundathi Krishna
Editor : Sreedevi G.
“Editing for ĀROH has been a definite learning experience. Working on the articles for ĀROH, being given the control to revise, modify and improve, to produce something greater than the sum of its parts, was extremely challenging, seeing as I was inexperienced for such a position. But once I knew what I was doing and outlined what I was meant to do, the editing process seemed far less daunting than it did before.
Being directed, supervised, managed, and taught by our Editor-in-Chief, making sure that our work was not dealt with haphazardly, and setting guidelines for the writers and editors alike, helped greatly in the creative processes involved with the production of a magazine and has encouraged me to learn a lot from this role.
Just as what ĀROH represents, progress and change could be seen in everyone that was involved with the creation of this magazine, including myself. ĀROH has taught me the complex balancing act of curating content, deciding what to include or what not to include, and making sure that the writers were as enthusiastic as we were about its success. And as a result, I feel quite delighted to have been a part of its creation.“
-Sreedevi G.
Editor : Soma Dutta
“This E-magazine was not something that was decided instantaneously in this semester. I think, since 1st semester we all had the idea of e-magazine, and it finally came into execution this semester. There were teams assigned for editing and designing. Days of planning and organizing of so many inputs finally resulted in the formation of Aroh!
Editing here was an easy job, not much was there to change. But the fear that my editing might hurt the writer’s sentiment was the difficult part.
However, editing also gave us a chance to read and understand the articles we received! It’s so amazing to see how wonderfully people write and how they engage in variety of topics and in so many different forms – poems, articles, facts, riddles!”-Soma Dutta
Editor : Sita S.
“I have always loved editing and this journey was particularly interesting as I was editing the works of my friends. Truth to be told there was not much work as an editor, as all the writeups were perfect. I was in awe while reading their works and forgot my role as an editor.
The most interesting part of this journey was not as an editor but to be a part in creating this magazine. This magazine is an outcome of several days of planning and execution where every member of the class is involved. Aroh has excelled as a product of creativity and I am proud to be a part of it.”
-Sita S.
Editor : Aiswarya Vasanth
“Euphoria wrapped in education hemming the love for lexis is indeed a boon in bliss. As an editor I bear immense privilege for having been a part of such an endeavor worth heart and soul. It indubitably did multiply my erudition in literature owing to the literary pieces of fellow comrades as the proof.”
–Aiswarya Vasanth
Editor : B.R. Chandana Nair
“It gives me immense joy and delight to be a tiny part of editing our very own class magazine “ĀROH”. Just like the gods and the asuras churned the ocean of milk to extract the nectar, we’ve tried to churn out creativity from this ocean of literature .A lot of effort has gone into the making of this issue. Amidst the busy schedule we have made an attempt to bring out the talent concealed within our student community. As I sat down to emend , I was totally inspired and invigorated by the musing of my fellow mates. I hope y’all enjoy every stop in this tour of the “ĀROH” from Grīṣmaḥ to Vasantaḥ as much as I have enjoyed amending it .”
– B.R. Chandana Nair
Āroh E-Magazine 