OREANDA-NEWS. October 16, 2012. The 2012 edition of Tata Crucible Business Quiz, a knowledge initiative from the Tata group which started in August, concluded with the grand national finals at Hotel Taj Mahal Palace, Mumbai amidst some exciting and enthralling battle of wits. After challenging and competing with some of the sharpest minds, the team from Chennai Silks, Coimbatore comprising of Arul Saravanan and Yogesh Pai emerged as winners of non-Tata track, while Sreekanth G and Jayakanthan from Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Chennai clinched the winner’s title for the Tata track at the back-to-back national finals.

The chief guest for the event, B Muthuraman, vice chairman, Tata Steel, and chairman, Tata International, awarded the prize of Rs5 lakh and the coveted Tata Crucible trophy to the national winners.

Mr Muthuraman said, "Quizzing is an activity of the mind that will create new ideas, new thinking and thinking in a lateral manner. So please participate in quizzes and encourage your kids to participate in quizzes in schools and colleges."

The 9th edition of the Tata Crucible Business Quiz, spread across two months, witnessed strong participation with over 1,800 teams contesting between the two tracks for Tata and non-Tata employees.

The non-Tata track had 20 regional winners who went through two semi finals, leading to eight finalist teams which were P&G, Genpact, Lotus Landmark, Saimitra Constructions, NTPC, Oracle India, Deloitte and Chennai Silks. The final eight teams in the Tata track included five teams from different TCS offices and one team each from mJunction, Tata Steel and Tata Elxsi.

On winning the national finals Mr Saravanan and Mr Pai from Chennai Silks said,"It’s the fourth year for us at the Tata Crucible Business Quiz finals and it feels great to have won. We want to dedicate the victory to our company, families, Coimbatore quiz circles and all quizzing enthusiasts. It’s really wonderful to see how the Tata group has been promoting and supporting quizzing on a massive platform through Tata Crucible."

Happy about winning the title, Mr Sreekanth and Mr Jayakanthan from TCS said, "We are happy to have won the Tata Crucible title once again and proud to have represented our company on this platform. Tata Crucible Business Quiz is a distinguished platform that gives corporates an opportunity to exhibit their knowledge."

The quiz was hosted by ace quizmaster Giri Balasubramaniam, aka Pickbrain, who through his distinctive style got the best out of the contestants and kept the audience captivated with the high-voltage action on stage.

The main highlights of the Tata Crucible Business Quiz are the exciting format and high infotainment; along with this, it provides ample opportunity for all sections of quizzers to participate. This ensures a greater diversity in the participant profile as they come from across sectors including media and entertainment, banking and financial institutions, IT and consultancy services and public sector institutions to name a few.

Adding two new cities this year, the Tata Crucible Business Quiz was held for corporates in 20 cities for the non-Tata track and eight cities for the Tata track. Starting with Ranchi on August 4, 2012, the quiz was held in Jamshedpur, Indore, Coimbatore, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Nagpur, Bengaluru, Delhi, Bhubaneswar, Goa, Pune, Mumbai, Lucknow, Gurgaon, Chandigarh, Cochin, Thiruvananthapuram, Kolkata, Chennai and Visakhapatnam.