To the question - who preceded Prince William's great grandfather as king - quizmaster V.V. Ramanan received permutations of every possible kingly name and number; some of the results were even fictitious. “No, it was not George IV, nor Henry VIII, not Louis XIV and there is no king called David the fifth,” he replied to several attempts at the right answer (which incidentally was Edward VIII). The quiz master's repartees to many of the wrong answers drew laughs from the audience.
This was one of the 25 questions posed to students of classes 7 to 9, during the preliminary round of The Hindu Young World Quiz 2011 here on Monday. This was the regional edition of the quiz, which is being organised as part of The Hindu- NIE initiative.
The preliminary covering an array of subjects including current affairs, history, chemistry, sports, biology, literature and the arts helped select the top six teams that moved on to the finals out of more than 700 teams that had registered.
However, the toughest question, according to students, was in identifying the only member of the order of proboscidea(elephant), which left the contestants scratching their heads.
Pranav Ananth and Vrshank Subramanian from Vidya Mandir Senior Secondary School emerged as the winners in the regional finals, with students of Kola Perumal Chetty trailing five points. Students of Bhavan's Rajaji Vidyashram came third. “We have been preparing for almost three weeks,” said Vrshank, who represented his school in the regional event for the second year in a row. “I try to skim through the newspaper every morning to brush up on my current affairs even if I am getting late for school,” added the ninth-standard student.
Many others participants too realised the importance of getting into the habit of reading newspapers as many of the questions were based on current affairs. The finalists had to rack their brains to deal with the good mix of audio-visual clips, framing questions for answers and topics related to the country. Students were asked to identify popular cartoon characters, an ancient Japanese martial art and the use of the Saffir-Simpson Scale instrument.
After music director Devi Sri Prasad gave away the prizes, he was surrounded by a group of excited students who wanted his autograph. The winners of the regional round will represent Chennai in the grand all-India finals, scheduled to be held in Thiruvananthapuram on November 14.
The title sponsor of this year's quiz is the Velammal Educational Trust and Extramarks Education Pvt. Ltd and Indian Overseas Bank are associate sponsors. The national sponsors are Black Thunder, Gold Winner, Amway, Maggi Noodles, Vizag Steel Plant, Wilco, Penguin, Firefox Bikes, Funfills, Reynolds, Cricket Caricatures and Success notebooks. Real Fruit Juice is the beverage sponsor, Bisleri the water sponsor, Tata Nano the car sponsor and I Ads & Events the events manager.
The regional sponsors include Milka Wonder Cake, Roshan Bag Mall, Venfield, Kesar Gift Mart, Sathya Agencies, Instore, Naturals, Mahavir Optics, India Post, Reebok (Velachery and Nungambakkam), VLCC, Sri Krishna Sweets, Turakhia, Donut, Marry Brown, Balaji Dental and Medimix.
