Before my arrival at YIF I knew one name in particular. Shardul. It turned out, I wasn’t the only one. In a batch of 285 fellows, it is hard to stand out and gain recognition. He wasn’t a Bollywood movie star and he hadn’t committed any heinous crime that would garner international attention (as far as I’m aware). So what had he done? And how did we all know his name? In this global world, Shardul had reached out to people before the programme began and connected with them over social media. It was effective. When he arrived on campus, everyone knew who he was. Simple, right? This is what I wanted to find out. I asked Shardul how exactly he went about this. He told me that after participating in the Jagriti Yatra Fellowship in December, he had realized the value of connecting people. Finding himself with some time on his hands post-graduation and before YIF began, he decided to try to connect in advance. His modus operandi was such: the YIF admin created an of...