Kolkata Quiz community

I was introduced with the kolkata quiz circuit pretty late during my college days in 1998,CU organized a quiz where me, tamal(mota) and Pallab(polu) won it. Then i  met Priyangku,kingshuk,christopher amos,formed a team  in DI open, met "The Grandfather of Indian Quiz family" Mr. Neil O'Brien,  he mentioned us The" poisonous people" as our team name was "hemlock. So that's how the journey began.

To mention few big quiz and big guns of kolkata quiz circuit, The "DI Open" by Dalhousie Institute,  "Argus Open",  Francis Groser (from Delhi) ‘s "SUMMER INVITATION QUIZ' at the Saturday club ,"Eddie Hyde memorial" quiz at The Parish house, " The Argus apex" quiz, sunday early morning quiz at " Landmark"and The " Apex Quiz Club" of gariahat comes in mind first. some of them normally goes for 1-2 days, quiz starts with qualifying round aka dry round on saturday evening, then 2 semifinal ,and then next sunday evening the mega final. If you can qualify for the final the clubs use to provide good snacks and drinks for the finalists and doing the quiz in those posh club lawns munching chicken club sandwich or mutton roll and drinking beer was an extra charm.They had sponsors and often lucrative cash and gift hampers for the winners and runner ups.Generally the winners and runner ups name and photo subsequently published in next day leading newspapers like The Statesman and telegraph.Here i saw some genius of not only kolkata but Indian quiz circuit like Doyita Dutta( BBC Mastermind champion) with her overall brilliance and knowledge for the team " Nutcrackers", Goutam Ghosh and Santanu chakrabarti( both BBC mastermind finalist) for the Argus Quiz club, i still remember Goutam da especially for his amazing concentration during the quiz and lust for victory, some people mildly criticize him time to time for this but it was ok to me, Sanjay Mukherjee the handsome IPS officer  a good QM as well-i remember he did a quiz in ekdalia area durgabari which was very close to South Point school and there was almost 10 visiting south point team enrolled for that quiz , Tathagata da of TNT TEARS caught our attention with his trademark beerglass and expensive Marlboro cigarette in hand in DI answering some tough questions, Mrs. Vimala Jagannathan with her profound knowledge in Indian mythology and with a very sober personality,Tintin( JU english dept faculty,everyone calls him tintin though he was way senior than us ) was a charming person with his profound knowledge in english literature from his school days in cambridge,Narsimhachary of IIM a very calm but was sharp like a hawk, IAS officer Atri da who was a very nice person and often helped the young guns like us to give places in a good team,Debangshu Dutta( another BBC Mastermind finalist) use to come from Delhi  sometimes a brilliant quizzard and a gentleman,Aniruddhachary with his clear prominent accent and confidence behind answering everytime,my quiz partner Christopher Amos a perfect gentleman with his casual approach answering tuffest questions, Mrs.Jayashree Mohanka a top executive from exide house , was a big name in our circuit and sometimes show up to the quizes with her adorable kids and finally the best among the pack the great Souvik Guha.IT commissioner Souvik da with his encyclopedic knowledge, guessing power was unique among all, simply he was the best that i've seen. Among few brilliant Quiz master i would like to mention Siddharth basu,Harsh bhogle, Roshan abbas, CP Singh, sanjay mukherjee and the controversial Parnab Mukherjee of Don Bosco school. Though lots of people cracked bad remarks about Parnab da, i found his encyclopedic knowledge behind " Anything Under the sun" quiz quite fascinating( part from some stubborn wrong fundas from time to time) and it takes guts to do an entire quiz all out of your memory without any set questions afterall.Finally, Mr. RM sen a renowned  veteran quizlover and a very good person.He use to mix a wonderful sense of humor during asking every question which i still remember.Here i've seen and talk few times with some celebrity QM like  Derek O'brien, barry O'brien, Francis Groser and Siddharth basu (during the BBC mastermind kolkata chapter). Occassionally in some quizes the organizers invited celebrity guests, this way i met Leander paes,Leslie Claudius, Baichung bhutia in DI and the most memorable one was to meet Adam Gilchrist and Glen Mcgrath at The Park hotel sports quiz organized by ESPNstar.

 second, comes the funny, chaotic college fest and social quizes.  we all bunk classes ,spend entire day in that college campus,do lots of chablami, adda,girl watching then go through the long brainstorming qualifying and final round.  we enjoyed the every moment of it as apart from the quiz the  chances of social interaction with friends and new friends during the fest was incredible. Few college fest quiz which i remember are the " Xavotsav" of St. Xaviers(often hosted by parnab da), "Milieu" of Presidency( by santanu chakrabarti), "Dhoom" of BNC , " Festum" of R Ahmed Dental college( by income tax officer rajib da) and others. I forget the other fest names but quizes in Loreto house -park st( our only chance in the year to get in there to do quiz and watch girls!), Goenka, IIM-Joka, Shibpur BE college( by krishnendu banik), City college, CMC, National medical college, NRS( they had general,sports and business quizzes every year) did some very good quizes. JU- Sanskriti of arts, science and Engineering section organized 3 quizes every year and we use to attend all of them, beside playing cricket and having ruti-tarka and the famous " DHOPER CHOP" at Milanda-boudi's canteen:). These were very good quality quizes as well.Among college quizzards,first of all my  friend Soubhadra of CNMC who later went out to became a very prominent name  in kolkata quiz circuit, Dipyaman sanyal whom i remember for his knowledge in painting,  Riju and kingshuk with their expertise in western music esp rock n roll , my dear friend Priyangku for literature and eastern music, supratik's overall knowledge, aroop's cartoon and comic strips, Sudip, probably the best sports quizzard in kolkata, The great Richard Mistry "the aranyadev of kolkata college quizzes", they had a gola team in the circuit the Richard-samrat-Riju trio, the famous JU team of Dipyaman, amit,samrat and arijit, Amitangshu acharya of Calcutta Boys school to mention. I also met few very nice good people who later bocome my friends from this circuit like Deep( subhodeb, now a doctor for Indian railways), The great Gopal, kingshuk, Mrinmoy da ,kallolda, kuntalda,somnathda and ofcourse Priyangku.Few funny characters whom we always use to tease like Gopal(  his Nero answer to rathin da was amazing), ujjal da( aka Ekmik cooker), sunando, ratan( who always claim that his real name is deepak, but we never beleived him!), The Great "LOGA"( Arnabjyoti paul), Goutam ,Tanushankar,professor calculus and many others. 

Beside the core quiz of kolkata, our Salt Lake CK-CL block use to organizes 2 very good quiz, one during Durgapuja the " chaturanga" by famous " kadu da" and the other " Spectrum" during kalipujo by Rupakda, in our karunamoyee housing Tutul, Indraneel sarkar and Sylva ( K block) did 2-3 times very good ones and Reek of G block did it couple of times as well. people from various parts of kolkata came and appretiated the quality of the quizes.I bacame close friend to deep( subhodev bhattacharya) and we are still part of a quiz club in kolkata having monthly session in someones home. whenever i travel to India i sit with them and simply love going back to my quiz days.

After coming to USA i missed it badly for few years then finally in 2007 we formed a Quiz club with  efforts from Indian students of CMU and U-pitt in Pittsburgh,PA. we had this  every friday night quiz in CMU( after a horrible semester of  classes, coursework and thesis work it was like a gods blessing to reduce our stress) Wean hall and enjoyed it very much for 2 years. Then after coming to atlanta i missed it for 2 years and then very recently in 2011 we formed the " Atlanta Quiz Club" and had 2 session so far.My friends looks passionate and enthusiastic about this and hope we can continue for years to come.

I won many many quizes, loose probably more than that and i consider myself a very average quizzard among the stalwarts i've seen, but that is not my point, frustration or pride. I feel myself lucky once to be a part of this great quiz culture, to meet lots of good people and not so good people but one common thing attached them together that they all loved the quiz from their heart like me. As long i live i will keep my passion and love for this great thing running down my bloodstream for ever.