Indian American Students Become World Geography Champions

By siliconindia   |   Friday, 09 August 2013, 22:28 IST   |    1 Comments
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Bangalore: 3 Indian American kids were successful in making Team USA the winner of the 11th National Geographic World Championship held recently in Russia. These kids emerged as champions after defeating contestants from 17 other regions, by correctly recognizing a nation whose flag has six small stars and its five offshore islands; the answer being Equatorial Guinea, as reported by Indo American News.

The team included- team captain Gopi Ramanathan from Minnesota, Asha Jain from Wisconsin and Neelam Kaur Sandhu from New Hampshire.

Ramanathan, apart from being the sixth runner up in the National Bee competition held in Washington the previous year, has also won geography competitions conducted in his state. “I was kind of surprised that they asked me to do it,” he told the St. Cloud Times. “I thought it was odd because it had been a year since I last competed in a geo bee, but I was happy to be selected, as reported by Indo American News.

Jain has spent 10 hours in a day preparing for the competition and she is extremely delighted with her victory. Her brother Vansh has competed in the National geography bee three times. According to their mother, Manisha Jain, "this is like a win for the whole family. We're all very happy because my son wanted to go to the world championship but was never picked’’, as told to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, over phone.

The competition has been conducted 11 times so far and Team USA has won 6 times, including the initial one in London, in the year 1993.