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Kolkata graduate’s team wins 'University Challenge' quiz

This win makes Imperial College London one of the most successful in University Challenge’s history, bagging the trophy for the fifth time

Kolkata graduate’s team wins 'University Challenge' quiz
Shajil Kumar
By Shajil KumarApr 09, 2024

The Imperial College London quiz team, which included computational science graduate from Kolkata Sourajit Debnath, has emerged as the winner of the champion’s trophy of ‘University Challenge’.

The win in Monday night’s final aired on BBC makes the London-based university one of the most successful in the show’s history, winning the trophy for the fifth time – the last time being in 2022.

The 31-year-old answered several challenging questions in the final and credited Imperial’s Quiz Society and mentorship from previous teams as contributing factors to his success.

“I feel elated to be a part of British quizzing history and grateful that our team had the opportunity to clinch the title while representing Imperial,” said Debnath.

In preparation for the challenge, the team spent months revising their specialist subjects and practising quizzes as a close-knit group.

Team captain Suraiya Haddad said, “I’m thrilled to have captained Imperial College London to its fifth historic win, making us the institution with the most wins in the history of the programme. We have all worked incredibly hard and done Imperial proud."

Amol Rajan, the British Indian presenter who hosts the popular BBC programme, described Imperial's victory as “remarkable”.

The team was awarded the 'University Challenge' trophy by host Amol Rajan and acclaimed playwright Sir Tom Stoppard at an event at Imperial College London’s South Kensington Campus.

Debnath has completed a Master’s in Applied Computational Science and Engineering at the Department of Earth Science and Engineering at Imperial College London, a degree he chose to pivot to a career in computational science.

In India, he was a space scientist at UR Rao Space Centre, the spacecraft-making arm of the Indian Space Research Organisation.

He had worked on the 2019 Indian lunar lander mission Chandrayaan-2, among other spacecraft.

After he graduated from Imperial College London, he joined an Imperial start-up focused on geophysics algorithms operating out of the university’s Royal School of Mines. (PTI)

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