BIT, Sindri, students rehearse for Karma festival in Dhandbad. (Gautam Dey)

Dhanbad, Aug. 24: If technology is their forte, tribal culture is their passion.

BIT, Sindri students have taken it upon themselves to promote tribal culture and tradition at their institute by constituting a society dedicated to it.

Established last year during the Karma festival, the BIT Cultural Society was formed by two teachers — Pradeep Bhagat of mechanical engineering and Ajay Oraon of chemical engineering departments.

It was the first time that the tech hub celebrated Karma on campus with a string of cultural programmes such as skits, songs, dance and drama highlighting different aspects of tribal culture.

The treasurer of the society, final-year BTech student Arvind Kumar Tirkey, said the festival also spread awareness about environment conservation by worshipping the Karma tree.

The society also represented the institute during the Sarhul festival organised in Dhanbad last year.

This apart, programmes like debate, discussion, essay writing, poetry writing were held throughout the year where students got to know more about tribal culture and languages like Kudukh, Mundari, Ho and Kharia.

Explaining the aims of the society, Tirkey said besides promoting tribal culture, the BIT Cultural Society also propagated the message of environment conservation.

He said earlier the institute used to declare a holiday during Karma but since last some teachers took the initiative of celebrating it on campus.

After a series of programmes, the society gained popularity and more students joined in. The students dipped into the institute’s tribal welfare fund and organised collections internally to pay for the events.

On the significance of a tribal society in a technical institute, Tirkey said: “Techies who are the flag-bearers of development must also take up the responsibility to preserve and promote their culture and tradition.”