Business Standard Quiz: Northern region - Team from Genpact bags the first prize

Sample this : What is the common thread between Narendra Modi, Nirbhaya, Sachin Tendulkar and Aishwarya Rai?
Answer: They are mango varieties.

This was one of the questions at the Business Standard quiz: Northern Region finals. After a written round and a further two rounds comprising six individual rounds each, the team from Genpact - Leo Thomas and Rohan Khanna - emerged victorious.

Hosted at the Apeejay School Of Management in Dwarka, the finals saw a frenetic pace of quizzing.

The winner went home with the grand prize of Rs 25,000, the first and second runners-up bagging Rs 15,000 and Rs 10,000, respectively.

The winning team has qualified to participate in the Business Standard Quiz final, to be held in Mumbai on February 14.

While the turnout for the quiz was a mix of educational institutes and corporates, the teams which made it to the finals were all corporates. Two teams from National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) and one team each from Dua Consulting, Indian Oil Corporation (IOC)-Delhi, PwC and Genpact made it to the finals.

"The participation was phenomenal. The performance in this city was at a much higher level than in Kolkata and Chennai. Really good," said the visibly impressed quizmaster, Gaurav Sri Krishna, who is also the leader for Asia-Pacific, India and MEA (Middle East and Africa) region in Tata Consultancy Services (TCS).

"Some of his questions were just beautiful!" exclaimed Purvabh Surana, one half of the team from Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, New Delhi, that made it to the semi-finals, "although a pounce-system should be introduced or else at this level, it boils down to sheer luck sometime."

The pounce-system in quizzing refers to teams pouncing, or buzzing, on a question that has gone unanswered. Something on the lines of first come-first answer. In the absence of a pounce, an unanswered question passes on to the next team in line till all teams get a chance or one team answers, whichever happens first.

While the first runners-up were K Suresh and Deepak Taneja from IOC, Sanjit Dutta and Chandan Shahi from NTPC qualified as the second runners-up.