To celebrate the 25 years of glorious Kargil Victory in 2024, Indian Army is undertaking many adventurous, cultural and educational activitie.
One such initiative undertaken by Army Welfare Education Society under Adjutant General Branch of Indian Army was to organise India’s biggest school quiz competition named Indian Army Quiz 2023. Famous as “Battle of Mind”, the quiz made headlines when 32,441 schools across the country registered for Round-1 in online mode and as many as 3,600 schools advanced into Round-2. After two online Rounds, only 216 schools in the country made it to Quarter Final Round, of which 15 schools were from West Bengal.
Suryodaya Auditorium at Fort William witnessed a grand Quarter Final on 20th November 2023 where 15 schools compete in gripping and fiercely fought Quarter Finals with 4 Rounds of 10 Questions each. In the Quarter Finals held today, 58 school students and teachers from various schools from Kolkata city, NCC students, Army officers, gallantry awardees witnessed the exciting quarter finals. National English School from Baguiati came first and 5 schools in addition qualified for the Semi Finals which are scheduled on 25th October 2023.
Amongst them Army Public School Barrackpore is one. APS Barrackpore has carved a niche for itself as one of the Senior Secondary Army Public Schools par excellence in the Eastern Command.
After their reaching semi final I talked to the students who participated in the quiz .
Agniva Roy, Debayan Ghosh and Debadrita Saha were very excited.”We are safe because of Indian Army. We salute their selfless sacrifice”. Debayan Ghosh shared his thoughts. “We are so much excited about the Semi final.We will try to win the upcoming rounds too.Our teachers motivated us a lot.”- Debadrita Saha .”If I get a chance I want to join Indian Army.I have lot of respect for them” Agniva Roy said.
Our students were well prepared, they took the event sportingly, it’s a new challenge for them.We always encourage them to give better performance in every aspects of life..It’s really a great initiative by Indian Army.We are grateful and proud of them.Sounak Bhattacharya , a senior teacher of APS Barrackpore shared his thoughts .
Major General RS Saini was Chief Guest on the occasion. All the Semifinalists, participants and their mentors were awarded Certificates and Cash Prizes for their splendid performance during the contest by the Chief Guest. On the sidelines of India Army Quiz 2023, the students had an opportunity to witness a motivating movie on Indian Army and its role in national development and its transformational change, weapons display and photo gallery showcasing the achievements of Indian Army. During the interaction with students, the gallantry awardees motivated the students to join Indian Army and contribute towards nation building.
Indian Military Academy Dehradun will conduct the National Finale which would comprise of Two Pre Final Rounds and a Grand Finale in New Delhi. Indian Army has been organising such kind of events to promote the budding talents and has been a major contribution in Nation Building.
(With Inputs from Indian Army)
Report- Pratyusha Mukherjee.
(Author is a Sr.journalist working for a western media with 20 years of experience in covering the east and northeast, with specialisation in Defence and Sports.In her illustrated career she has covered many major events and achieved International and National media awards for Journalism).
