Let there be food on the plate, he recited in Hindustani. Freedom in our thoughts. Discussions, friendly and angry. Ideas in libraries. And may the universities have the pulse of the universe.

Akhil Katyal penned and performed Dua, in dino - a prayer of the times - in February this year, shortly after the arrest of Jawaharlal Nehru University Students' Union president, Kanhaiya Kumar. As Katyal belted out sentence after sentence at different events in Delhi organised by Bring Back the Poets (BBTP), a "spoken word" poetry initiative, the young audience erupted in applause.

Spoken word, often used interchangeably with slam, is a term applied to poetry intended specifically for performance before a live audience. Katyal's verse is full of words that are carefully placed and packed with energy. Poet performers use the dynamics of tone, gesture and facial expressions to drive home their point. The overall effect: an adrenalin rush, a heady sense of purpose.

Across Indian metros, groups are reciting poetry. Pubs and restaurants organise reading sessions. Word festivals are being held. And the poets perform to packed houses.

"Spoken word poetry, as an art form, is perfect for voicing dissent, just as it is perfect for voicing your vision of a beautiful world," says Shantanu Anand, founder of Airplane Poetry Movement (APM), a Bangalore-based organisation that has been popularising this poetry form.

Sure enough, it seems to have caught the imagination of the urban Indian youth. "Youngsters across the country have a lot of bottled up anger. This is one of the ways to vent it," says Priyanka Menon of Pune Poetry Slam.

Ramneek Singh, 26, is one such passionate young man from Jammu. His compositions are like word scythes, attacking the establishment on a variety of issues. His poem Jhelum is a critique on militancy and extrajudicial killings of civilian youths in Kashmir.

Singh regards his performances as a constructive way of channelising his angst, but he is aware that they make his close friends and family members squirm. "Your family and close friends are generally worried considering how it is so convenient for the administration to slap someone with sedition charges". His poem Samvidhaan is a comment on Section 377, which criminalises same-sex relationships, while 'Roz Chhat Par se' is about the poet watching a plane full of people flying to a different world where they expect judiciary to be more impartial, not brute and  where no one is sentenced to death.

"Individuals, in a chaotic society like ours, hunt for forms of expression through which they can represent themselves uniquely, instead of having their voices represented by politicians or mass media. Some take to performance poetry, others take to forms of humour, satire or visual arts," says Saumya Choudhury, a performance poet and the founder of Delhi Poetry Slam, which produces spoken word festivals.

In its initial days in India (pre-2013), spoken word poetry was regarded as a Western import. It was largely inspired by slam poetry, available in the form of video grabs of live performances on the Internet. "Naturally, in the initial days, the predominant language of spoken word poetry was English. But now we have poets who compose in Hindi, Marathi and even Urdu," says Trupthi Shetty who founded The Poetry Club (TPC) of Mumbai with Ankita Shah.

So, while the 24-year-old Shah performs her English compositions Fire and Vice to express her anger against honour killings and Borders on racial discrimination against Nepalese people in India, Singh utilises the jagged cadence of Hindustani to highlight the grief of a Kashmiri mother whose son was "sacrificed" in the name of AFSPA, the controversial Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act. In a poem co-written with Ankita Shah on exodus of Kashmiri pandits, he explains the grief of a kid who doesnt find Shikaras in Jammu any more ; and a little girl who sits on the doorway wondering where all the Chinars vanished.

" Tum aakhri safhe pe Urdu likhna/ Main Hindi likhoonga pehle panne par/ Jis jagah pe aakar milenge dono/ Woh hi zubaan hamaari hai (Your Urdu flowing from the last page, My Hindi coursing from the first, And where they shall merge, The fountain of our speech)." writes Saurabh Jain, a data analyst from Mumbai, whose protest poems are in Hindi. The quoted lines attack religious fundamentalism.

The spoken word, BBTP founder Aditi Angiras stresses, is not just a performance arts movement, but also a social movement. The 27-year-old Delhi-based poet points out that BBTP has been part of numerous student-led movements and campaigns from Occupy UGC (against the University Grants Commission's earlier decision to scrap certain student fellowships) to Pinjra Tod (against sexist hostel rules for women students). It also organises Extremely Queerious Poetry twice a year, a platform for poetry dealing with gender and sexuality.

Angiras, however, stresses that not everybody supports activist poetry.

"There hasn't been any censorship as yet, but organisers of a recent poetry meet didn't upload either the video or the transcript of a new poem by our most rebellious poet, Abhimanyu Verma. The poem, written in Urdu, bitterly criticises the Prime Minister's policies and moves." Angiras apprehends trouble as soon as these poems come into the limelight, but she commends Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, who she says is open to any criticism and interested in discussion with protesters.

Even though such protest poetry is getting a fair amount of appreciation and some poetry meets are attracting commercial sponsors, purists continue to regard this genre with more than a dash of disdain. Himant Divate, an acclaimed Marathi poet, editor and publisher, says: "Most of these poems are superficial, loaded with emotions and high-decibel melodrama, much like prime time debates in television channels." According to him, unlike poems read out at traditional mushairas and kavi sammelans, these are easy to compose as poets don't have to adhere to rhyme, form or character."

Jain agrees that some poets ignore the quality or craft of poems and are content to play to the gallery. "But I am sure with time everyone will learn the craft better with more practice," he adds.

Shah of TPC doesn't agree with the view. "Freedom from meter or rhyme makes it easier for both poets and the audience to enjoy poetry," she argues. "This is more contemporary and bridges the time gap. You can't expect today's youth to appreciate the sonnet."

Angiras of BBTP doesn't care much about the quality of poems. She feels the USP of spoken word poetry is its freewheeling format. "This form promotes a culture of political inquiry and debate among youth. Young people have not found a platform in traditional or even new media to voice their dissent, but in spoken word poetry they have found their voice."