The Kolkata Sports Quiz Festival 2023 was the third edition of the annual sports quizzing festival organised by Gyaanspace, a leading knowledge services company, in association with The Telegraph and t2Online. Being held at the Satyajit Ray Auditorium at ICCR on July 22 and 23, this festival was a unique blend of quizzes held on different aspects of the world of sport, along with interactive sessions with important personalities involved in the world of sport. This edition was bigger and better than ever, with a lineup of eight quizzes spread over two days. The quizzes, where participants competed in teams of three, were Football, Women in Sports, Cricket, Sports in Pop Culture, India in Sports, World Cup Cricket, and General Sports. There was also a sports quiz exclusively for school children from Class VII-XII to kick off the festival. It was a national-level event with participants travelling from all across the country, like Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Pune, Thiruvananthapuram, Varanasi and more, along with quizzers from across West Bengal.
Titas Banerjea (right) and Kunal Mandal of Gyaanspace, organisers of the Kolkata Sports Quiz Festival. They said, “Every year our company Gyaanspace organises the Kolkata Sports Quiz Festival and this was our successful third edition. Every year this festival has grown in terms of quality and quantity. This year our participants came all the way from all over the country and also from Dubai, which is very exciting. I was astounded by the amazing answers. It was my honour to host the final event along with Joy Bhattacharjya, who has been a mentor to us,” said Banerjea, knowledge manager of Gyaanspace Knowledge Consultants LLP.
Pawan Patodia, owner and chairman of Kolkata Thunderbolts, was the guest speaker who dropped in to witness the Kolkata Sports Quiz Festival and gave a motivational speech to all the participants.
Twin brothers from Barasat P.C.S Government High School, Karishnu Banerjee and Kritadhi Banerjee were the winners of the School Sports quiz.
Ramakrishnan V, Varun Parthsarathy and Sankhya Krishnan made up the team from Dubai who won the Kolkata Sports Quiz Festival by winning the final round and the Cricket quiz and Football quiz. They said, “It was a thoroughly enjoyable quiz fest. Firstly, I would like to acknowledge the entire organising team and the quizmasters’ efforts in managing to hold seven quizzes in two days without any time overruns, slippages or glitches whatsoever. The overall execution was incredibly smooth and seamless, and the credit ought to go to the organisers. The venue and the overall experience, especially for the outstation participants like me, were really good, which made the trip totally worthwhile and a memorable one. We look forward to turning up for the subsequent editions.”
Deepanjan Deb, Sachin Deshpande and Piyush Kedia won the India in Sports quiz. Deepanjan said, “India as a theme is very close to our heart and to win the India quiz felt special. Thanks to my teammates Sachin and Piyush who were outstanding. It was an enjoyable quiz and the last question finish made it entertaining for those on stage as well as for the audience.”
Nikhil Sarkar, Sumantra Sarathi Datta and Ramesh Natrajan won the Sports in Pop Culture quiz. They said, “Having been to multiple quiz fests in India over the last decade, we can confidently say that the Kolkata Sports Quiz Fest 2023 has been one of the best fests we’ve ever attended. The quality of quizzes, the convenience of the auditorium, the organisation, everything was top-notch. Of all the quizzes, we might be biased here as our team won it, we particularly enjoyed the Sports in Pop Culture quiz! Kudos to the organising team and can’t wait for the 2024 edition.”