A Grand Ending to a Great Season

On March 22, 2009, the third season of the Bombay Quiz Club draws to a close. Anannya Deb will conduct. The league standings are here, but there isn't really much at stake -- unless you're speaking of abstract notions like pride, and honour, and the respect of your beer-sozzled peers. Come and partake. The details:

QM: Anannya Deb

Time: 3 pm, Sunday, March 22, 2009 (Please be there by 2:40 pm.)

Venue: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

Five-in-one quiz report

Right, after immense and inexcusable tardiness, this post combines five quiz reports in one. Four of them are regular BQC quizzes, and one is a lit quiz conducted for the Kala Ghoda fest. In BQC quizzes, members of the top three teams get 10, 7 and 4 points respectively. In open quizzes with elims and finals, the non-placing finalists get two points each.

In the delay in posting these results, some records were damaged (or maliciously done away with; who can tell?). As a result, some results are incomplete, and we shall fill them in later as news filters in. Until then, here's what we have:

BQC Jan 25 -- conducted by Souvik Basu
1st Amit Varma, Sajith Pai, Udatta Duarah + 1, 2nd Unknown as of now, 3rd Sumit Roy, Kaustuv Gupta + 2

BQC Feb 8 -- conducted by Mukund Sridhar and Atulya Bharadwaj
1st Pradeep Ramarathnam, Souvik Basu, Sarat Rao, 2nd Vibhendu Tiwari, Shiv Anant Tayal, Bikash Mohapatra, 3rd Sumit Roy, Govind Grewal, Arvind Krishnaswamy

Kala Ghoda Lit quiz -- conducted by Sumant Srivathsan
1st Mahesh Murthy and S Balakrishnan, 2nd Anand Sivasankar and Ajith Prabhakar, 3rd Girish Shahane + 1, Other finalists Govind Grewal and Shambhu Shankar, Amit Varma and Arvind Krishnaswamy.

BQC Feb 22 -- conducted by Pradeep Ramarathnam and Atul Mathew
1st Rajiv Rai, Atulya Bharadwaj, Rohit Ajitkumar, 2nd Vibhendu Tiwari, Brian D'Souza, Roshith, 3rd (tied) Sumant Srivathsan, Vijay Shankar + 1, 3rd (tied) Ajith Prabhakar, Devang Ghia, Kaustuv Gupta

BQC March 8 -- conducted by Amit Varma
1st Sumant Srivathsan, Kaustuv Gupta, Bikash Mohapatra, 2nd Rajiv Rai, Shiv Anant Tayal, Meher Sridhar, Rahul Gaur, 3rd Anannya Deb, Atulya Bharadwaj, Barun Chakravarti.

And now for the league standings:

BQC Season three Standings (from 24 quizzes, as of March 8, 2009)

124 points
Rajiv Rai

82 points
Sumant Srivathsan

61 points
Vibhendu Tiwari

58 points
Udatta Duarah

54.5 points
Amit Varma

53.5 points
Aadisht Khanna

48 points
Atul Mathew

45 points
Ajith Prabhakar
Sumit Roy

44 points
Kaustuv Gupta

42.5 points
Rishi Iyengar

41.5 points
Pradeep Ramarathnam

40 points
Ameya Samant
Sajith Pai

39 points
Atulya Bharadwaj

37 points
Rohit Ajitkumar

36 points
Souvik Basu

35 points
Sandip Sen

34 points
Bikash Mohapatra
Govind Grewal

33.5 points
Anannya Deb

32.5 points
Francis Rodrigues

32 points
Brian D'Souza
S Balakrishnan

29 points
Anand Sivasankar

27 points
Mahesh Murthy
Shrikant Narasimhan

26.5 points
Prasann Potdar

24 points
Kedar Sastry
Vijay Shankar

22 points
Amit Pandeya

21.5 points
Sarat Rao

18 points
Shiv Anant Tayal

17 points
Avinash Mudaliar
Mukund Sridhar
Rahul Gaur

15.5 points
Akash Bansal

15 points
Devang Ghia

14 points
Akanksha Mathur
Mitul Kodali

12 points
Sireesh Talluri Rao

11 points
Ravi Venkatesh

10 points
Amit Sharma
Arvind Krishnaswamy
Dhananjay Shettigar
Kashyap Pandeya
Phani Prasad
Rushi Bhavsar
Sandeep Rajpurohit
Srini Rajagopal

9 points
Mukund Krishnan

8 Points
Manish Mishra

7 points
Ajay Ravindran
Arjun Swarup
Avinash Umapathy
Kaustubh Chakravarti
Meher Sridhar
Nandan Krishnaswamy
Norbert Fernandes
Raamesh Gowri Raghavan
Rahul Bhaskar
Roshith
Shreya
V Sreeharsha

5.5 points
Janardhan R
Leo Mirani
Nrupal Chaudhari
Rasik Tirodkar
Vikram Joshi

4 points
Barun Chakrabarti
Gopal Kidao
Mithun Srivatsa
Neelabh
Rajendra Parmar
Supriyo Saha
Vijay Chittoor
Vikas Sahu

2 points
Shambhu Shankar

The last quiz of this BQC season will be conducted by Anannya Deb on Sunday, March 22. More details on this blog in a few minutes.

The March Quiz

There are two more quizzes to go in the BQC's third season, and the penultimate one takes place this Sunday. Details:

QM: Amit Varma

Time: 3 pm, Sunday, March 8, 2009 (Please be there by 2:40 pm.)

Venue: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

Yes, I know -- the results of the last four quizzes haven't been published here yet, and I am solely to blame for that. I shall wait till this one is over now and publish the results of all five together. Many apologies for the delay. As for the standings, very briefly, Rajiv Rai has now sealed first place, Sumant Srivathsan has sealed second place, and Vibhendu Tiwari is, I think, half a point ahead of me (Amit Varma) for third. And as I'm not taking part in this next quiz, by virtue of being QM, you can consider that place settled as well. The war is over -- two fun battles remain!

The Other S Basu Conducts A Quiz

The 20th quiz of the third BQC season will be conducted this Sunday by Souvik Basu, with a little help from questions by J Ramanand. Given that it's the Republic Day weekend, some of you might have considered leaving the city, taking a break with the family, suchlike.

Ha.

The details are below; keep yourself away if you can.

QM: Souvik Basu

Time: 3 pm, Sunday, January 25, 2009 (Please be there by 2:40 pm.)

Venue: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

From the West: If you... ah, never mind.

David Thrashes Goliaths

The first quiz of 2009 was in jeopardy when the scheduled quizmasters backed out, but Pradeep Ramarathnam saved the day by conducting an old quiz that he had once attended. BQC's third season has entered its last leg, with Rajiv Rai far ahead of everyone else in the league table, and only Sumant Srivathsan even remotely close to him. Would there be a mighty battle between these two in this quiz? There was -- for second place.

Atul Mathew, Sajith Pai and Phani Prasad put together a fantastic show, leading almost from start to finish, to win by a hefty margin. Sumant's team ended up second; Rajiv's team finished third; and while the top places in the league table remain unchanged, we just got yet another demonstration of the immense depth of the BQC.

Here are the results:

1st with 402.5 points
Atul Mathew
Sajith Pai
Phani Prasad

2nd with 375 points
Sumant Srivathsan
Ravi Venkatesh
Francis Rodrigues

3rd with 325 points
Rajiv Rai
Shiv Anant Tayal
Vikas Sahu
Supriyo Saha

4th with 237.5 points
Amit Varma
Atulya Bharadwaj
Vishvesh R

5th with 227 points
Anannya Deb
Sarat Rao
Srikant Narasimhan
Puneet Raj

6th with 175 points
Ameya Samant
Devang Ghia
Srinath Narayan
Amalesh Mishra

7th with 142.5 points
Vibhendu Tiwari
Rahul Gaur
Roshit Mohan
Mukund Krishnan

8th with 135 points
Udatta Duarah
Prasann Potdar
Akanksha Mathur

The league standings, after 19 quizzes of Season 3, stand thus:

BQC Season three Standings (from 19 quizzes, as of January 11, 2009)

107 points
Rajiv Rai

70 points
Sumant Srivathsan

53.5 points
Aadisht Khanna

48 points
Atul Mathew
Udatta Duarah

47 points
Vibhendu Tiwari

42.5 points
Amit Varma
Rishi Iyengar

40 points
Ameya Samant

38 points
Ajith Prabhakar

37 points
Sumit Roy

35 points
Sandip Sen

32.5 points
Francis Rodrigues

31.5 points
Pradeep Ramarathnam

30 points
Sajith Pai

29.5 points
Anannya Deb

28 points
Govind Grewal
Kaustuv Gupta

27 points
Rohit Ajitkumar
Shrikant Narasimhan

26.5 points
Prasann Potdar

26 points
Souvik Basu

25 points
Atulya B
Brian D'Souza

24 points
Kedar Sastry

22 points
Amit Pandeya
Anand Sivasankar
S Balakrishnan
Vijay Shankar

17 points
Avinash Mudaliar
Bikash Mohapatra
Mahesh Murthy
Mukund Sridhar

15.5 points
Akash Bansal

14 points
Akanksha Mohan
Mitul Kodali

13 points
Devang Ghia

12 points
Sireesh Talluri Rao

11.5 points
Sarat Rao

11 points
Ravi Venkatesh

10 points
Amit Sharma
Dhananjay Shettigar
Kashyap Pandeya
Phani Prasad
Rahul Gaur
Rushi Bhavsar
Sandeep Rajpurohit
Srini Rajagopal

9 points
Mukund Krishnan

8 Points
Manish Mishra

7 points
Ajay Ravindran
Arjun Swarup
Avinash Umapathy
Kaustubh Chakravarti
Nandan Krishnaswamy
Norbert Fernandes
Raamesh Gowri Raghavan
Rahul Bhaskar
Shreya
V Sreeharsha

5.5 points
Janardhan R
Leo Mirani
Nrupal Chaudhari
Rasik Tirodkar
Vikram Joshi

4 points
Arvind Krishnaswamy
Gopal Kidao
Mithun Srivatsa
Neelabh
Rajendra Parmar
Shiv Anant Tayal
Supriyo Saha
Vijay Chittoor
Vikas Sahu

The next quiz will be conducted on Sunday, January 25. More details will follow on this blog.

The First BQC Quiz Of 2009...

... will be conducted by Pradeep Ramarathnam this Sunday, January 11. Our scheduled quizmasters backed out, and Pradeep has kindly stepped into the breach to provide half a quiz. We still need another half, but shall have that sorted out before the quiz begins. The details:

QM: Pradeep Ramarathnam + 1

Time: 3 pm, Sunday, January 11, 2009 (Please be there by 2:40 pm.)

Venue: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for the quiz.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

Newcomers are welcome at BQC quizzes, and do not need to form teams before coming. Teams are normally formed by a draw of lots at the venue itself, and everybody gets to take part. The questions are generally not the boring "you-know-it-or-you-don't" types, but accessible and workoutable ones.

Jacques Lacan and the sexual act

Arvind Krishnaswamy conducted a quiz for the BQC yesterday, and much activity happened. Jacques Lacan described an orgasm with an equation, Veerappan proposed to Phoolan Devi, Robbie Williams became Peter Gabriel and a pretty female terrorist almost killed Chou En-Lai. Amid all this action, Sumant Srivathsan resumed his winning ways, romping to victory with able team-mates Sandip Sen and Brian D'Souza. Rajiv Rai and his team ended up second. Aadisht Khanna, Pradeep Ramarathnam and Sireesh Rao split third place with Ameya Samant, Devang Ghia and Akanksha Mohan; and Jason Kresja conceded many, many runs.

This was the last BQC quiz of 2008, and scenes of immense mourning followed the quiz, as well as some hedonism. But that must remain confidential.

The results:

1st with 138 points
Sumant Srivathsan
Sandip Sen
Brian D'Souza

2nd with 96 points
Rajiv Rai
Atulya Bharadwaj
Nandan Krishnaswamy

Tied 3rd-4th with 68 points
Aadisht Khanna
Pradeep Ramarathnam
Sireesh Rao

Ameya Samant
Devang Ghia
Akanksha Mohan

5th with 64 points
Amit Varma
Anil Kothuri
Srikant Narasimhan

6th with 46 points
Vibhendu Tiwari
Janardhan R
Bikash Mohapatra

7th with 42 points
Udatta Duarah
Rahul Bhaskar

8th with 26 points
Atul Mathew
Swapnil Patil

And now for the league standings:

BQC Season three Standings (from 18 quizzes, as of December 21, 2008)

103 points
Rajiv Rai

63 points
Sumant Srivathsan

53.5 points
Aadisht Khanna

48 points
Udatta Duarah

47 points
Vibhendu Tiwari

42.5 points
Amit Varma
Rishi Iyengar

40 points
Ameya Samant

38 points
Ajith Prabhakar
Atul Mathew

37 points
Sumit Roy

35 points
Sandip Sen

31.5 points
Pradeep Ramarathnam

29.5 points
Anannya Deb

28 points
Govind Grewal
Kaustuv Gupta

27 points
Rohit Ajitkumar
Shrikant Narasimhan

26.5 points
Prasann Potdar

26 points
Souvik Basu

25.5 points
Francis Rodrigues

25 points
Atulya B
Brian D'Souza

24 points
Kedar Sastry

22 points
Amit Pandeya
Anand Sivasankar
S Balakrishnan
Vijay Shankar

20 points
Sajith Pai

17 points
Avinash Mudaliar
Bikash Mohapatra
Mahesh Murthy
Mukund Sridhar

15.5 points
Akash Bansal

14 points
Akanksha Mohan
Mitul Kodali

13 points
Devang Ghia

12 points
Sireesh Talluri Rao

11.5 points
Sarat Rao

10 points
Amit Sharma
Dhananjay Shettigar
Kashyap Pandeya
Rahul Gaur
Rushi Bhavsar
Sandeep Rajpurohit
Srini Rajagopal

9 points
Mukund Krishnan

8 Points
Manish Mishra

7 points
Ajay Ravindran
Arjun Swarup
Avinash Umapathy
Kaustubh Chakravarti
Nandan Krishnaswamy
Norbert Fernandes
Raamesh Gowri Raghavan
Rahul Bhaskar
Shreya
V Sreeharsha

5.5 points
Janardhan R
Leo Mirani
Nrupal Chaudhari
Rasik Tirodkar
Vikram Joshi

4 points
Arvind Krishnaswamy
Gopal Kidao
Mithun Srivatsa
Neelabh
Rajendra Parmar
Ravi Venkatesh
Vijay Chittoor

The next quiz will probably be on January 4, 2009. Watch this space for further updates.

The Christmas Quiz

To account for the Christmas holidays, the 18th quiz of this season will take place a week early, on December 21. This Sunday. Arvind Krishnaswamy will conduct, hopefully in a Santa Claus suit. Be there -- or wait till next Christmas. The details:

QM: Arvind Krishnaswamy

Time: 3 pm, Sunday, December 21, 2008 (Please be there by 2:40 pm. Ha!)

Venue: Pinstorm, Ground Floor, Swati House (Next to Kotak Bank on Linking Road), North Avenue, Santa Cruz (W).

Directions:

From the south: If you come north on Linking Road from Bandra to SantaCruz, you'll find a large Benetton Store on the right. At the end of that block is a Kotak Bank at the corner. Take a right and it's the next building, take the first gate and tell the sentry you've come for a meeting.

From the north: If you get on to Linking Road at the airplane park end, you'll cross a HDFC Bank. A block later, you'll see a Kotak Bank on the corner - do not cross it. Take a left at that point and it's the building next to Kotak Bank.

Newcomers are welcome at BQC quizzes, and do not need to form teams before coming. Teams are normally formed by a draw of lots at the venue itself, and everybody gets to take part. The questions are generally not the boring "you-know-it-or-you-don't" types, but accessible and workoutable ones.

The winning team get free reindeer. Er, wait, we're out of stock. Okay -- they get stinky socks to hang by the fireplace. Fine?