Where It All Began: A First Batch Reflection at Ten Years

Written by: Nihilaa V M

When CHRIST University opened the Bannerghatta Road Campus ten years ago, it was a place waiting to become something more than a set of buildings. It was fresh paint and unfinished corridors, a quiet stretch of road without restaurants or noise, and a space holding its breath for the young people who would soon walk in and fill it with laughter, chaos, ambition, and dreams. Among those who walked through its doors in 2016 were Vipin Nagarbavi and Aparnaa, students who stepped into a campus that did not yet know itself, but would eventually learn to grow through them.

For Aparnaa, who came to Bengaluru from another city to pursue her BBA, the campus felt like the beginning of an adventure she could not yet define. Today she works in digital marketing in Chennai, but the moment she begins speaking about Bannerghatta, her voice shifts, softens, and glows with memory. She laughs when asked for one standout moment. There is not one, she insists. Instead, her mind returns instantly to cultural days, the kind that turned ordinary weeks into festivals. She remembers classrooms transforming into rehearsal rooms, benches pushed aside, beats counted loudly, everyone moving together as if connected by one heartbeat. The adrenaline of the performance was unforgettable, but what lives most vividly in her memory are the last-minute chaos, the inside jokes, the shared nervousness, and the thunder of applause that still gives her goosebumps.

Vipin remembers the same raw energy of those early days, but his story began in a different corner of the campus: the Department Fest, Aram. As a triple major student of English, Political Science, and History, who would later complete a postgraduate degree in Linguistics from Deccan College, he found himself organizing an event called Dungeons Bygone, a three-day puzzle-based treasure hunt that unexpectedly became the most popular event of the festival. There were no templates to follow, no seniors to guide them, and no roadmap. They were building traditions from scratch, inventing culture in real time. It was here, amid the excitement and exhaustion of planning, that Vipin discovered his passion for puzzle making and event design, something he laughs about now, seeing how that creativity shapes the way he teaches today.

The library holds a special place in Vipin’s story. In the beginning, it was just a locked room, non-functional for the first two semesters. When it finally opened, the Graphic Novel section was the first shelf to be completely stocked. Curious, he picked up Maus by Art Spiegelman, a book that shook him deeply and pulled him into genocide and Holocaust studies. Years later, he now teaches a course on genocide studies at the very campus where the book first found him. He describes the journey as accidental but inevitable, a path that was waiting for him long before he recognized it.

Like Vipin, Aparnaa found that the experiences she once thought routine were shaping her future. Business fests, something she had never even heard of before joining Christ, became pivotal training for the field she works in today. The research she once brushed off as amateur now feels like the foundation of her professional life. She smiles, remembering the discipline Christ enforced, the structure that grounded her when the city felt overwhelming. She jokes about attendance, how she lost it in college, and somehow still manages to lose attendance at work too. Yet she admits that what once felt like strictness now feels like guidance that prepared her for everything that followed.

Campus life back then was stitched together by small adventures. The eighth-floor cafeteria did not exist, but was a locked door to the terrace. The basement, now buzzing with dance rooms, music studios, sports facilities, and a gym, was an unfinished space echoing construction. The auditorium did not even have seats during orientation, and students sat wherever they could, amused and unbothered. There were only a handful of food options on campus: ICH, now Mingos, Cafe Coffee Day, Nandini, Pit Stop on the fourth floor, and a tiny ICH counter on the fifth. With nothing much outside campus, students practically lived at Malabar Mess. Vipin recalls a moment when rumours spread of its demolition. The entire campus rushed there in solidarity, as though trying to save a piece of themselves.

Years later, the transformation is undeniable. The campus is bigger, louder, brighter, and filled with thousands who may never know how empty and quiet it once was. Vipin, now a faculty member teaching in the same classrooms where he once sat, watches the new generation enjoy the things his batch only dreamed of. There is no envy, only pride. It feels surreal, he says softly. To return, not because he had to, but because he wanted to.

A decade has passed since those first steps were taken. The campus now stands tall, not just in structure but in spirit, built by the hands, laughter, and resilience of those who came before. Buildings changed, traditions formed, generations arrived and graduated. But the memories, raw and glowing, still live in the hearts of those like Vipin and Aparnaa, who were there when it all began. Their stories remind us that Bannerghatta was never built only by architects and engineers. It was built by students. It continues to become, year after year, with every new dream that walks through its gates.