Dr. Ruchi Mital is the Principal of the Ruchi's Institute of Creative Arts, Allahabad. She has completed her PhD from Rajarshi Tandon Open University. She is the AIPC member of IIPC, Life Member of National Conservation Society as well as a member Company Bagh Allahabad and organized a wide variety of events on craft fairs, painting exhibitions, garment presentations, talks on women empowerment and vocational education, etc. She is awarded numerous awards such as Honorary Citizenship Award of the city of Maitland, Outstanding Youth Personality Award of Allahabad Junior Chamber, Avantika Rashtriya Gaurav Samman. She has also published 3 papers and 3 books.

Ruchi's Institute of Creative Arts

What keeps you connected with the education sector?

"To help student in learning and growing through educational skills"

The sector which always has and will be scope for learning is education be it any field, even if I talk about my field of profession which is fashion and textile where I have been working from past 35 years, there are very few people who got into teaching line for this kind of courses which are actually new and still taking professional shape but it has been always my interest. As I always feel that education is the best tool to interact with different kinds of people and it keeps you in touch with the younger generation because it keeps you alive.

What is your philosophy of leadership?

“Treat others with kindness and help them to grow along”

I truly believe that leadership doesn’t function properly if you don’t collaborate with others as a team, because teamwork is the most important aspect no matter which field you have opted for. So leadership quality always depends on how good someone is with their team. If you have a good team where everyone takes care of each other's welfare, your part is done, you have managed to be a good leader.

How do you ensure best practices of the industry are being followed at your college?

“Practical implementation of whatever you read and understand is must to fully grasp the concept”

In my opinion, the fashion and textile sector is based, whatever theory is there unless and until you do the practical and practice it then this theory doesn’t make any sense. For example, if I have to convey a design to someone and I start explaining it then in that case your visual and my visual can be different but if same thing is drawn or illustrated then even with a 2-D sketch your visual and my visual can be the same and a platform so the practical approach must be taken care of.

Which industry-oriented events are conducted regularly in college?

“By organizing workshops, events, competitions on a weekly or monthly basis”

We keep conducting workshops and creative events for our students like competitions on a weekly and monthly basis for designing courses. Also, we have interactive sessions of students with industry people for deeper and better understanding and practical approach towards courses. Since those industry courses are practically based and just because the market keeps changing within 6 months and the syllabus is also revised once every 3 years so you have to keep a pace with the industry also. Overall, all these practical assignments with workshops, lectures, competitive assignments, Interaction with industries take place.

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What obstacles are created for institutions due to COVID period?

“To train teachers and students effectively by the use of online tools

It was a really tough situation that we all have gone through in recent times, and actually not only all institutions have faced it but we kind of had an edge because we were already conducting some online classes with some of the faculties where we had weekly lectures from them for the students. But I must admit, it was a bit difficult to train all our teachers to take online classes although it took a little time. Staff did overtime to create lectures to get into online platforms for teaching but on the good side it was a learning for all of us as we had to go online, we had to teach students, have to upgrade students also since we are polytechnic institute so we get students from very different backgrounds and most of them are from the rural background so connectivity was an issue with them, hence at times we were interacting with them at night times too so at the end of the day it was difficult but a good learning graph.

How is your college welcoming to the students coming from different races and economic backgrounds?

“By providing scholarships and fee refund policy by Samaj Kalyan for economically weaker students”

Since we’re a polytechnic institute, the the students who come through joint entrance examination and if they have a family income less than 2.5 lakhs then definitely they can apply for fee refund to Samaj Kalyan so that is there and also depending upon the category and some parameters total fees are refunded by the government.

How is the placement performance from your department?

“We provide 100% Placement assistance to our students”

Placement is definitely not an issue with us, the issue is that students expects instant gratification which is not possible in the fashion industry, the ones who takes starting struggle as a journey are doing pretty well in life, since I have been working in this field from past 35 years and some of our students got themselves settled as well. Because this field itself is work oriented and recently the market isn't like it used to be earlier when students used to earn around 20K in starting times only and after getting some experience in the industry, they started earning up to 50K per month. So Since we have a lot of students and our policy is each one must be placed and to be worth mentioning our alumni really helps the students with placements.

What is the college’s top priority over the next 10 years?

“To expand college in the business skills”

College priority is to expand the college in the business field and to make the college one of its kind in this area at least since we’re known for our teaching skills, our experienced staff and it takes a lot of effort to put practical approach as it’s not theory.

How do you ensure to have a healthy relationship with students at the institute?

“To organise interactive sessions for the students”

We keep on organizing some sort of activity every 15 days, since our field is so creative that whatever we do has a fun factor. During online classes also we have interactive sessions like dance competitions, poetry writing and some other stress releasing activities. We have annual sport functions, annual exhibitions, garment presentations, we conduct online garment presentations also. One thing I would like to mention here is last year during covid times we conducted activities for students where they made their project, wore dresses, shot videos and it was something new and an amazing experience.

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Any suggestions to the current youth and the aspiring students?

“Believe in yourself and be patient”

In my viewpoint, students need to be more patient and more focused. Because in today’s time youth wants instant gratification and it doesn’t work in real- world, you have to be both patient as well as focused to achieve something in life and shifting your goal post doesn’t help