Written by Karthik Sunil, Riya, Vishvesh Trivedi
The Literary Affairs Committee (LAC) of SVNIT conducted the first Inter-NIT MELA (Music, Entertainment, Literature, Arts) Quiz on the 22nd of May, 2021. Over 19 NITs participated in this neck-to-neck battle of wits on Saturday evening. Each NIT was allowed to send a maximum of two teams (of four participants each). The quiz was conducted over Google Meet, where the Quiz Master (QM) displayed and read out the mind-boggling questions, which the participants answered on a Google Form for the preliminary round and on Whatsapp for the final rounds.
The top 12 teams from the preliminary round qualified for the finals, which were further split into three rounds: ‘Q’s Gambit (Betting Round)’, ‘Pick Your Poison’, and 'Long Connect'. After an intense round of quizzing, the 12 teams that made the cut were: “Rulers of Rohan” from NIT Warangal, “Comfortably Dumb” from NIT Durgapur, “Ingenuity” from NIT Puducherry, “SurTEA” from NIT Surat, “BaZnGa” from NIT Nagpur, “Quo Vadis” from NIT Durgapur, “Jan van Eyck-thoo” from NIT Warangal, “The Marauders” from NIT Surat, “ECE” from NIT Silchar, “Cuatros Hombres” from NIT Jamshedpur, “NITK Surathkal Team 2” from NIT Surathkal, and “Straight Outta Kozhikode” from NIT Calicut. The preliminary rounds ran fairly smoothly, but the players had to put their game face on for the next round, Q’s Gambit.
In the Q’s Gambit round, the 12 teams pitched against each other could gamble their points and try to gain an upper hand. The top 6 teams qualified from this roster to the next round. Although the competition was tight, “Rulers of Rohan”, “SurTEA”, “Quo Vadis”, “BaZnGa”, “Straight Outta Kozhikode”, and “NITK Surathkal Team 2” fought their way into the next round of the quiz.
The remaining two rounds were: 'Pick Your Poison' and 'Long Connect'. The six teams had to play both the rounds, from which the scores would be tallied. After a nail-biting competition lasting almost two hours, “Quo Vadis” from NIT Durgapur bagged 1st place with 340 points, “NITK Surathkal Team 2” from NIT Surathkal placed 2nd with 330 points, and “SurTEA” from NIT Surat ranked 3rd with 320 points. Apart from the main rounds, the event had ‘Audience Questions’ sprinkled throughout where spectators could try their luck. The event ended on a friendly note from LAC, proposing that an annual Inter-NIT Quiz should be conducted to maintain the culture, preferably by NIT Durgapur, since they won this year. Overall, the event was a huge success, giving students the perfect platform to compete in good spirit and also providing an excellent refreshment from the monotony of online classes.
Interview with LAC Head
Upon interviewing the LAC Secretary, Yash Baberwal, after the end of a fruitful event, he had nothing but praises for his club. LAC prides itself on conducting various events such as debates, literature festivals, and quizzes, every year. However, due to the ongoing pandemic, members found it rather difficult to orchestrate any event with the “limited resources” last year. This year, they decided to tackle the issue by doing the events online. Even though the “ultimate plan was to organise an Inter-NIT debate,” due to existing restrictions, they had to stick with the quiz.
Yash thanked his joint secretaries, Sahil Shahi, Garvit Saini, and Akanksha Jain along with the rest of the 3rd year, 2nd year and 1st year members who made the event a success.
He said, “It is in fact very delightful to have a bunch of lovely people working in our team. I have spent four years in this club and with my experience, I can say that with 20+ NITs and around 180 participants, the event was executed quite phenomenally. Apart from that, when the stage was completely set, it was the Quiz Masters who had to perform. There were 7 of them: Zahabiyah Zaveri, Vishal Agarwal, Milind Shinkar, Naisargi Shah, Prisni Roy, Rahul Rajpurohit, and Ashutosh Dash. So when they came up with such good questions that even the people from other colleges could appreciate, we definitely took it as a big achievement.”
Yash Baberwal admits that he “did not expect such a large crowd to show up” for the event given it was being conducted online. Expressing his gratitude to the clubs and student bodies of participating NITs, Yash expressed, “Here, I would like to applaud the efforts, coordination, and cooperation of other NITs, without which the event wouldn’t have been a success.”
Finally, on being asked for information on any such future events, he replied with zeal that they are “striving to conduct events like Inter-NIT Debate and Literature festivals in the near future. Apart from these, LAC will keep conducting interactive group discussion events and quiz contests for students to learn, explore, and enjoy.”
Karthik Sunil
Senior Editor
Renesa
Riya
Junior Editor
Renesa
Vishvesh Trivedi
Correspondent
Renesa
LAC Instagram Handle: @lacsvnit
