Things are meant to fit in a box not people

[Applause]

namaste thank you so much for having me

here with you today dit university

um a very warm welcome to the management

to our professors our teachers thank you

so much

thank you to all the students who turned

up and a big shout out to the organizing

committee for pulling this off

in these times can we give it up for the

organizing committee everyone

cheers to you guys um i’d like to start

with um

a short moment of silence for uh the

braveheart who lost her life recently in

hatras

so may i request you to please maintain

silence for the next

thank you you can choose to stand or sit

however you like it

let’s just say a small collective prayer

thank you

all right so i wanted to begin this

morning which is now afternoon

with my favorite lines by my favorite

poet which i read

back in school called robert frost and

they stayed in my heart forever

this is how they go i shall be telling

this

with a sigh somewhere ages and ages

hence

two roads diverged in the woods and i

took the one less traveled by

and that my friends has made all the

difference

so let me tell you that i was the moral

child in school okay i was

every indian parents dream kid i was i

was killing it at studies you know i was

scoring well

i was doing everything that i was

supposed to do i

i actually topped my board examinations

and made it to the college of my dreams

basically i was i was doing everything

that that you’re supposed to do when you

follow a set pattern

precisely i was in a box i was inside a

box

um now let me tell you about things that

i loved to do

as a student i love to paint you know i

love to dance i’m a trained classical

dancer i loved

loved being a part of the debating

society of my

school in college i used to always

wonder

that why is it that there’s only one

arts class in the entire month

and two math classes every day the

answer that i’ve

never got delayed by the memory

professor

um so then moving on i want to now come

over

to a day that completely changed my life

to the first day that changed my life

which was the day of my college

placements i’m sure a lot of you

students sitting here will relate to

that

so you know i dressed up in my favorite

shirt and my pants and

pressed it ironed it out and my mom

helped me um get dressed and put up my

my big smile and my confidence and i

walked into the room where these

were these honchos from you know google

and some of the biggest organizations

were out there

to to place us to basically write our

fate and our destiny it was in their

hands

so i was extremely confident it was a

smooth interview i made it

two days later i had my offer letter in

my hand

so i really wanna tell you i was i

should be ecstatic right i should be

extremely happy

this is the moment that i had studied

for my entire life right

my family was ecstatic though i come

from a very simple

middle class punjabi household where we

need reasons to celebrate yeah there was

a feast okay

because so parents are extremely happy

but i know something is irking me

in the back of my head something was

disturbing me

i kept asking myself why am i not happy

why am i not able to celebrate this

moment

so um i lived in a small one room

apartment and there was a store that my

mom had converted into my study

so i locked myself in the store room and

i kept staring at my offer later

i asked myself a simple question

what makes you happy creativity or

analytics

where do you see yourself 10 years from

now what’s

really what truly do you do you see

yourself becoming

and i got the answer guys and i went to

my father

i mustered up the courage to go up to

him and

i told him dad i don’t want to take up

this job

and my father was the most calm composed

gentleman that i know

only said um he only showed me something

he didn’t say a word he said

you see that roof above we lived in

a small one room and he said this loaf

is leaking

it’s leaking and i don’t have the

resources to repair this

so we truly need this job even after

this if you

if you plan on not taking this up and

throwing away this opportunity

i’ll still stand by you but it’s your

responsibility and your accountability

so i’m trying to tell you that i never

came from a place of privilege where you

know

it’s very easy to follow your heart and

give away the security of a job no i

didn’t come from that place

but the thing with us creative

eccentric people is that we never follow

a pattern you know

we don’t follow our paths and i don’t

know i personally truly feel that

things are supposed to fit in a box not

people

not you not i we’re supposed to

you know be infinite we’re supposed to

do whatever we want to do

we’re supposed to paint the canvas of

our lives with whatever color we want

that should not be predecided and i’m

extremely grateful to my 19 year old

self to that little girl

who was confused and she gave herself

the opportunity

to be who she wanted to be not who she

was supposed to be

moving on cut two

ten years later but before that let me

tell you a little about my struggle in

the field emceeing anchoring it wasn’t

easy guys

i i a round of applause for the anchor

who introduced me and now it is a

full-fledged profession

big up to you girl thank you but thank

you

but back then this was not a profession

okay

this was not a real job it was not a

real profession

so i had to genuinely go ahead and knock

so many doors

make so many calls wait for hours to

meet people

just to convince them that you need an

emcee for your event

not not even that you need to hire me

that you actually need an emcee

so as not just believing in myself but i

was believing

that this is going to be a full-fledged

profession in a couple of years

i have performed at the most bizarre

places you know without a stage

i have performed in buses in roadsides

in the remotest of cities that you can

name and think of

um in a mall in a small canopy without a

mic

shouting at the top of my voice without

a green room you know i used to

knock a door in residential colonies and

request lady

can you please let me change in your

home it was super tough

but then cut to ten years later cut two

is the language in theatre and movies

which means now 10 years later i

performed in over 24 countries around

the world in the most

iconic venues with the most iconic

artists

that i can think of from er rahman to

shahrukh khan whoever that you can think

of

i have won all the major awards and

accolades in

my category in my fraternity

and then that disturbance in the back of

my head

started again it started irking me you

know

what next what am i doing

am i again fitting myself in a box so i

started learning to act theater happened

to me

i started giving a lot of auditions then

i um cracked a role i

got a hindi bollywood movie acted as a

lead in that it was a beautiful

experience

um i i grew up a community of

lakhs of people online i don’t know they

call them influencers these days

but i think if you’re a real influencer

you’ll influence

ideas and thoughts and minds and not

just put pretty pictures out there

um i i also am an entrepreneur i just

happen to co-found a

startup with a friend next i want to

write a book

so who did i want to be a google

executive

what do you get when you google my name

today you know entrepreneur actor

live host social media influencer and

there’s a whole lot of world of

possibilities and things that i can do

now i’m coming to the second day that

changed me forever and changed my life

i’m going to take a breath so um

i was hosting sorry i was addressing a

press conference

for the first time in my life as an

actor for the promotions of my movie

and um you know there was this young

little girl who was standing there on

the podium

i was really happy to see her i was

smiling at her

i was being nostalgic going back to my

old times and days

and my struggle and it was a smooth

press meet

and um i just waved a bite to her before

leaving and i just

uh smiled at her and then something

happened that changed my life forever

this girl comes running to me and you

know in our culture we bend down and we

do this

the girl bent down and she touched my

feet

and when somebody does that in your 20s

to you you don’t know how to react right

because i never saw myself like that i

never put myself on a pedestal i was so

busy working and running and

following my heart that it escaped me

that in the process

i was actually influencing young minds

their career choices their life paths

their thoughts their ideas that day

changed me forever

that day made me realize that our job as

entertainers

as creative people and by creative

people i don’t just mean actors or

anchors i mean artists i mean dancers i

mean

painters i mean lyricists writers poets

everybody we have the power to create a

larger impact

we have the power to actually impact

people’s choices

in life if you’re an entertainer and

you’re only entertaining

i respect you and i don’t judge you

but that day taught me that as an

entertainer that as an artist

i could create a bigger impact out there

i could i could contribute to the social

fabric

of the society that i could add grace to

the society

and i think we should use every

opportunity every stage

every moment of the camera to do that

that we should set a good example so

today

i’m a sustainability advocate um

you know i’m an animal rights activist

i’m a vegan evangelist

i invest in vegan brands

don’t worry i don’t force my vegan

agenda on you i

i talk about sustainability i support

brands and designers that

make sustainable fabrics like these

i’m proud to say that i do a lot of work

for animals

i rescue and save a lot of animals

foster them

love them care for them this is my small

way of

giving back to the universe that’s

that’s given me so much

so the point in the end that i’m trying

to make over here is

magic happens to you when you let it

happen

magic happens to you when you don’t let

yourself

be defined you know by anybody not even

by yourself

magic happens to you when you realize

that you’re not a thing

to be put inside a box i truly hope

that all of you sitting in this room

today no matter what age you’re from

what background you’re from whether

you’re privileged or not

you muster up the courage to listen to

that one voice

inside your gut you know at the back of

your head

to follow your path take that chance and

take that leap of faith

thank you

you