For everyone who thought IIT-M’s Saarang began and ended with inter-collegiate action, Sunday’s Spelling Bee was a game-changer. In the fest’s first-ever spelling bee contest that allowed participation from city schools, audience, participants, judges and IIT-ians were taken aback when both first and third places were bagged by high schoolers. Mind you, it wasn’t easy: not unless you consider spelling SYZYGY or VISICISSITUDE a piece of cake. Of the 16 finalists who made it through the prelims to the final round, a whopping 14 were from school.

Conducted by India Spell Bee, the contestants managed to keep afloat by spelling words quickly and well and very few went unspelled. LOGORRHOEA and PHARMACOPEIA were two that did leave them stumped, but all was well as five finalists (all girls at that) charged into the final round.

With 60 seconds to spell as many words (correctly) as they could, twelfth grader Veena Venkataramani (Vidya Mandir) spelt an impressive 12 words to be crowned queen (spelling) bee. Journalism major Neha Mujumdar came in second while tenth grader Ashwini Raja clocked in third, spelling nine words. Surprisingly, Veena said that she had never really taken part in a spelling bee before this.