Tata Crucible national finals

Vizag Steel emerge victorious at the 6th edition of the 'Tata Crucible Corporate Quiz'
Mr. Sabyasachi Pani and Mr. Santanu Dey of Vizag Steel were awarded the National Champions trophy and a cash prize of Rs. 4 lakhs

Mumbai, October 04, 2009: The grand national finale of India's most challenging business quiz, the Tata Crucible Corporate Quiz 2009 was held on Sunday, October 04, 2009, at the Crystal Room of the iconic Taj Mahal Palace & Tower, Mumbai. In what turned out to be a nail biting finish, the team of Sabyasachi Pani and Santanu Dey from Vizag Steel beat the rest, blitzing ahead with their lightning fast responses and robust reasoning skills. They were crowned the National Champions of the Tata Crucible Corporate Quiz 2009.

Over the past two months, the 6th edition of the Tata Crucible Business Quiz has seen some exciting contests in the regional rounds held across the country. Nearly 1,400 teams in all participated in the 18 regional rounds for non-Tata corporates and eight regional rounds for Tata companies. The 18 finalists in the external track included technology firms like Sun Microsystems, Google and Yahoo India, media organisations like Mudra Communications and Savoir Faire and manufacturing companies like Bhilai Steel and Vizag Steel among others. The eight internal track finalists included teams from Tata Consultancy Services, Tata Steel, Tata Elxsi and mjunction Services.

The national final round of the Tata Crucible Corporate Quiz saw the 18 regional winners from Ranchi, Patna, Panaji, Cochin, Coimbatore, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Kolkata, Bhubaneshwar, Indore, Mumbai, Chandigarh, Jaipur, Delhi, Lucknow, Pune, Ahmedabad and Chennai, face-off in two semi-finals. The two semi-finals which were held between nine teams each had several moments of brilliant quizzing demonstrating the super-fast reflexes of the participants. The top four teams from each semi-final progressed to the National Final. The eight finalists were Vizag Steel (regional round winner from Bhubaneshwar), Accenture (regional round winner from New Delhi), Bhilai Steel (regional round winner from Patna), Savior Faire (regional round winner from Panjim), Yahoo India (regional round winner from Bangalore), Vizag Steel (regional round winner from Kolkata), Sun Microsystems (regional round winner from Mumbai) and Chennai Silk (regional round winner from Chennai).

Known for its innovative formats of quizzing in the past years, the Tata Crucible Corporate Quiz was once again presented in a new avatar. The quiz featured five rounds and with each passing round, the increasing degree of difficulty pushed the contestants to think at lightning speed and respond even faster. Interesting questions such as "ISO 4217 describing three letter codes defines what? (Answer: Currency codes e.g. INR, USD); Which current bestseller is associated with Project Solomon Key? (Answer: Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol) were posed to the contestants. Quizmaster Giri Balasubramaniam aka Pickbrain kept the audience glued to their seats, with his innovative and humorous style of quizzing.

The chief guest for the evening, Mr. Kishor Chaukar, Managing Director, Tata Industries Ltd. handed over the coveted Tata Crucible trophy and cash prize of Rs. 4 lakhs to the winning team, along with a host of other attractive prizes. Three teams - Accenture, Savoir Faire and Chennai Silk - were tied for the runner-up position. Speaking on the occasion Mr. Kishor Chaukar said, "It has been very satisfying to see the quality & quantity of response Tata Crucible has been able to elicit over the last few years. The teams have shown an incredible depth of knowledge and a very fascinating and at times amusing flight of imagination while answering the questions. From what I have seen in India and internationally, these teams are a match to the best in the world. Tata Crucible has been a terrific success for all concerned."

In the internal track held for Tata companies, the team comprising Mr. Suresh Kumar and Mr. Aniruddha Dutta from TCS emerged victorious and received the Tata Crucible trophy and cash prize of Rs. 4 lakhs. The runner-up in the internal track was the team from mjunction Services consisting of Mr. Debasish Mukherjee and Mr. Subashish Dey.

Additional prizes to the winners were given from Ascot (the formal men's wear range from Westside), Croma, Ginger, Tata Steel, Titan, Tata Indicom and Tata Housing.

Congratulations to the Tirupur Tughlaqs for having made it that far, and almost going the entire mile. You've made us proud.