It is with great sadness that I share the news of the untimely passing of someone I regarded as my little brother, Aryaman Kapoor. He is mourned chiefly by his parents, Vivek and Sonia Kapoor, and the family and friends whose lives he touched in ineffable ways.

It has been over two weeks since Aryaman left us. As his friends, most of us do not know how to cope; a 23-year-old soul with many incredible adventures, stories, and memories awaiting him, now abruptly missing from our lives. Everybody grieves differently, and I continue to contemplate how to begin recounting his significance to me. 

This forum seemed like a fitting place to start, because it was through the forum, about five years ago, that I first interacted with Aryaman. 

I should begin by noting, in candour, that Aryaman was not the typical international law enthusiast one would imagine associating a group dedicated to that field. In 2021, he was inducted to the forum as an Editorial Assistant, where I thought of him as a versatile and proactive second-year student, who never thought any activity (e.g., WordPress, or social media management) beneath him, and as someone who was always curious, driven towards growing and further learning. In 2022, he was promoted to being an Editor at the forum, and in 2023, after my graduation, he took over as the Co-Editor-in-Chief. However, and I maintain this frankly—Aryaman had no selfish incentive (e.g., a profile boost or progressing in international law) to stay with us. His contributions to the forum, in reality, were one of far too many inspiring accomplishments to count, towards which he persevered during law school. After graduating, he worked with AZB and Partners as an Associate in their Competition Law team; a selection for which an association with this forum would have hardly helped him (unlike myself, who used the opportunity to network with like-minded people). So, why, then, did he stay with the forum for this long? 

I say with confidence, as anybody who knew Aryaman well would know, that he tried his hand at everything; he was not a Master of every trade he indulged in, but certainly most, to the point that made one wonder if he would leave any interesting stories for the rest of us. As a finite example of his infinite curiosity, where I would think about the quality of the blog-posts we received, Aryaman would go on to ask—who is our audience, not in the abstract, but in concrete, statistical terms? The little devil would soon come back with a way to map it all out, not just for us, but also the mainstream blogosphere in the field! Many of us would think about the intersections between the law and technology, yet Aryaman would take the rare and additional step early on to learn skills like coding from the other schools in our university. Aryaman, indeed, was never limited to law as a discipline or an academic pursuit; his vision for himself and the world took him to the depths of business management, artificial intelligence, people skills, unconventional ways of dispute resolution, and far too many more things to name; I adored Aryaman dearly, but I cannot say I truly grasped the complexity of his talents and interests except superficially. 

Allow me, then, to return to my previous query; why this forum? Why for this long (2021-2024)? Not just that, he was indispensable to the sustenance and growth of the forum. It was with his leadership, vision, and collaboration, that we organised the first-ever Conference hosted by this forum, where he managed to have a former Chief Justice of India grace the occasion; something never then imagined. It was with his contributions that we revamped our forum’s style, social media presence, event management, and more; it was with his sense of ownership that my then Co-Editor-in-Chief, Rishav, and I felt comfortable passing the mantle to him and Tamanna. Of course, his reviews of the pieces we received were always rigorous and insightful. 

However, he taught me something rare and important as a colleague—the importance of feeling joy in collaboration as an end in and of itself. In other words, he just loved doing stuff with his friends! He was passionate not only about the result, but about the opportunity to grow, to use his skills towards productive initiatives, and to make memories in the spaces in between. That passion for fun was enough to inspire his numerous and laborious contributions to this young and humble forum. I can say without doubt, that while the forum may not have professionally contributed significantly to Aryaman’s career, his role was absolutely critical to the forum itself. 

Yet, it is not truly to celebrate these contributions that I pen these words for my friend. The reality is that the forum only acted as the medium that facilitated a deeper connection between us. When I remember him, I will recall the first trek of my life, where we walked together from Dehradun to Mussourie, where this prankster told us there would be a barely noticeable incline and that Maggi would be available at every other checkpoint; only to have practiced, himself, weeks in advance, long incline walks over the treadmill. I will remember the unassuming  innocence exuded by his face and expressions, underlying which was a wholesome and mischievous fellow of many shenanigans. I will recall teaching him the Ukulele on multiple occasions from scratch, because he was too proud to get good enough at it to be able to play anything other than what he already knew, the peak of all stringed instrument music, i.e., the riff of ‘Smoke on the Water’. I will remember him effectively living in my college dorm room (shared with Rishav) for our overlapping law school period, to the point that we once considered bringing his mattress over to us from his different hostel. I will remember the many jam sessions we had together, including once in Bhopal, my home-town, singing off into the sunset atop a mountain adjacent to our most gorgeous lake; a moment that he decided was the right time to dispute whether Udaipur or Bhopal may rightly be called the city of lakes. I will remember the reliable goofball who was always, exceedingly, thoughtful and generous with his gifts and affirmations; as one example, making Mahima (the Co-Founder of this forum) uncomfortable when, on his suggestion, we got her a fancy coffee-maker when she returned to the university as a faculty member. There is so much more to him (and indefinitely more than only I can say), but alas, it is better reserved for the intimacies of the friendship we were fortunate to share with him. All this to say what I already have—on behalf of Rishav and myself—Aryaman was not just a former colleague or one of the brightest and most interesting or quirky people I will ever meet in my life. He was our brother. 

I will never get used to referring to you in the past tense; I do not know how to imagine a future without you in it. Our lives will never be complete without you, Aryaman. They are richer still for having had you in them. Rest in peace. 

– Abhijeet Shrivastava