Three students — a boy from Davangere district and two girls from Belagavi — secured first place in Kannada medium, scoring 623 out of 625.
In Belagavi, Sahana Shankar Kamagoudar of M.K. Kavatagimath High school of Chikkodi and Shruti Basanagouda Patil of K.R. Hukkeri High School in Gokak scored 623. Both are from private Kannada medium schools.
Shruti’s father, Basanagouda Patil, a lecturer, said he put his daughter in a Kannada medium school to ensure she is rooted in her culture.
At Harihar town in Davangere district, M. Abhishek, the son of an autorickshaw driver, secured the top spot. Abhishek, a student of Mysore Kirloskar Trust’s Laxmanrao Kirloskar School, Harihar, secured 125 out of 125 in Kannada, 100 out of 100 in English, Hindi, science, and mathematics and scored 98 in social science. Abhishek shares the top spot with two others from Belagavi district.
Abhishek’s father Manjunath occasionally also doubles as a taxi driver. When Abhishek’s results were out, he had gone to Haveri to ferry passengers. Netravati, Abhishek’s mother, who is a housewife, was in school with her son to share the joy with his teachers. Abhishek is the eldest of three children. She said they will try to mobilise resources for his further studies. Abhishek wants to pursue science and take up PCMC combination as his next choice is engineering. School headmaster Vinod S. Hegde told The Hindu that it was the first time that the school got the first rank in the State. “While our students had secured other ranks among the top 10, this is the first time that we got the top rank”, he said.
