If anyone thought that winning a national quiz championship is the preserve of competitors from metros or winning the honour at the national level is the exception rather than the rule for those from smaller towns, then it is time to change that perception.

The Chennai Silks duo from Tirupur, M. Arul Saravanan and Yogesh Pai, who were crownedgnb national champions of the corporate edition of `Tata Crucible-the Business Quiz’ in 2012 (non-Tata track), showed that their appetite for winning has not diminished a wee bit, winning the Coimbatore round of the `Cerebration Business Line Corporate Quiz 2014’ held at Coimbatore on Saturday. They are on course to pitting their wits against some of the brainiest guys (and gals too!) from other cities in the finals to be held later this month in Mumbai.

 The significance of their achievement could be appreciated better if one understands that Coimbatore is the smallest city hosting the Cerebration Business Line quiz this year, the others being Chennai, Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Ahmedabad. The winners are from Tirupur, that is smaller than Coimbatore itself!

After a gruelling preliminary competition that saw a number of participants being eliminated, the list was pruned to six teams and the Tirupur pair emerged winners scoring 40 points and edging out the second prize winners who scored 35 points.

In fact there was a wide gap between the first and second placed teams and the rest of the competitors in the final round, with the team placed third scoring 20 points.

Does winning in a tough competition require intense preparation? Not really, say Saravanan and Pai. They do not consciously prepare for competition, but their interest in acquiring knowledge or finding out the ‘why’ behind anything that strikes them has helped them in their interest in quizzing.

Their interests are complementary. While Pai is not interested in sports, Saravanan is a sports buff. This helps them tackle questions from different fields while facing the quiz master. While Pai is an MBA, Saravanan is an engineer. But that did not prevent Pai from answering questions relating to the engineering field!

Pai said he and Saravanan have been together as a Quiz Team for the past eight years and their crowning moment was winning the Tata Crucible Business Quiz at the national level in 2012 (non-Tata track). They emerged runners-up at the Cerebration competition in Coimbatore last year. But this year they emerged victorious and would participate in the national level finals.

Pai was gracious in victory saying that when a quiz master poses a question, the answer is known to every competitor. What makes the difference is how quickly a participant grasps the question and comes up with the right answer. It is how fast one understands and responds that makes the difference in the end. But what has happened in the quiz universe is that it has gone beyond the stage of memorising answers to questions that are likely to figure as part of a quiz master’s arsenal. The questions are framed so differently now that participants have to connect two or three things to come up with the winning answers.

While rating the Cerebration Business Line quiz event on a par with Tata Crucible, they felt that dissemination of information on the event should begin much earlier so as to draw wider participation.

Saravanan said Coimbatore has many quiz aficionados and the town's `Coimbatore Quiz Circle’ (CQC) meets every fortnight, with the annual quiz competition drawing participants from Hyderabad, Thiruvananthapuram and Chennai. Particularly after they were crowned national winners of the Tata Crucible competition, quizzing has become a thriving activity in the texcity. Their win has also boosted the confidence of local competitors, who were earlier diffident while facing rivals from metros such as Chennai.

Pai said initially when he and Saravanan came to participate in quiz competitions in Coimbatore, they were dubbed the `Tirupur Tughlaq’ duo as people were sceptical of their winning skills. But that perception has changed now! They were also grateful to their employer Chennai Silks for the support extended to them. The Chennai Silks MD Chandran personally donates Rs 1 lakh as prize money to the annual competition conducted by CQC at Coimbatore

The participants found a capable Quiz Master in Lloyd Saldhana who kept tossing questions in quick succession. The questions ranged from why the manholes in Mumbai vanished so frequently (there was a spurt in demand for iron because of construction activity for the 2008 Olympic games in Beijing!) to who said the words for boxer Evander Holyfield’s Real Deal BBQ sauce advertisement  `it’s ear-lickin’ good (who else-Mike Tyson!). In between he kept the audience involved by lobbing a few questions at them as well.

A. Krishnaswamy, Deputy General Manager, Union Bank of India, Coimbatore (Union Bank is the title sponsor for the event) presented the first prize to Arul Saravanan and Yogesh Pai. Balasubramaniam, Director, and Ashwin Balasubramaniam, Chief Operating Officer, of Brookefields, Coimbatore, won the second prize and Sheilendra Bhansali and Priya Bhansali from Kumbhat & Co (Charted Accountants) secured the third prize.

The associate sponsor for the event is SAIL and the regional sponsors are HUDCO and MTNL, the gift sponsors are Lawrence & Mayo and VIMAL and the radio partner is 92.7 Big FM.

The eight regional winners will lock horns for national honours at Mumbai on March 30 in what promises to be an engrossing duel. 

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