New Delhi: The first stage of the 13th National Inter-School Cryptic Crossword Contest (CCCC 13.0) has concluded, with Bihar emerging as the frontrunner as the competition moves to its second stage.
The contest’s opening phase comprised three online rounds, with cumulative scores used to determine the national leaderboard. From thousands of participants across India, the top 10 teams have been announced, and six of them hail from Bihar.
Anhad Kaur and Divya Dhiman from BCM Arya Senior Secondary School, Ludhiana, secured the top position. The runner-up spot went to Dhairya Pandey of Don Bosco Academy, Patna, while Shraddha Shree from St Michael’s High School, Patna, claimed third place. Delhi Public School (DPS), Patna, produced two qualifying teams, with Nanya Dev Singh and Tanmay Kashyap in fourth place and Saptak Gupta and Hemang Chandra at sixth. Darbhanga also made its mark, with Vaishnavi Nayak of Holy Cross School and the duo of Sudhanshu Nayak and Shubhi Srivastava from Darbhanga Public School securing spots in the top 10.
In total, Bihar placed 29 teams in the Top 100, followed by Maharashtra with 21 qualifiers and Delhi with 13. At the institutional level, Delhi Public School, Pune, led with 11 qualifying teams, while Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan’s Public School, Hyderabad, Adarsh Public School, New Delhi, and Ambedkar Residential School, Bihar, each saw 10 teams qualify.
Altogether, 100 teams from across the country will proceed to the second stage, which will feature a virtual face-to-face round in September. Organisers said they were encouraged by the level of participation and the quality of performance, highlighting the contest’s role in nurturing problem-solving, linguistic skills and critical thinking among students.
