The National Finals of ConQuest 2017 was held on 1st September 2017 at the School of Law, Christ University, Bangalore. Intense competition in four Regional Rounds produced 8 teams ready to battle for the title of “National Champions of ConQuest 2017”. National Law School of India University, Bangalore (NLSIU) were present to defend their title against determined opponents from the School of Law, Christ University (SLCU), Bangalore; Symbiosis Law School (SLS), Pune; Gujarat National Law University, Ahmedabad (GNLU); Ramjas Colleges, Delhi; Campus Law Centre, Delhi (CLC); and two teams from the National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata (NUJS).
Raghav Chakravarthy kicked off the quiz with all the teams enthusiastically answering the questions in the 1st Potpourri round. The end of the 2nd Potpourri round saw SLS Pune at the top of the leaderboard – closely followed by Ramjas College, School of Law, Christ University and GNLU. After the ‘Connect’ and ‘3 Clues’ rounds SLS Pune’s score stood at 95 points, leading Ramjas College by 15 points, with the home team SLC a close third. The audience was actively engaged throughout the event, animatedly applauding the teams and eagerly answering questions posed to them by the quiz master.
The teams at the top, separated by a few points, went into the last round – the buzzer round that tested accuracy and speed – knowing that this round could make or break them. GNLU had raced from the 6th to the 1st position by answering every buzzer question correctly in the West Regional Finals – leaving the other teams and the audience shocked. Now they found themselves in the 4thposition along with the defending champions NLSIU. Could GNLU mount another last minute blitzkrieg? Would NLSIU push forward and reclaim the title for another year?
The atmosphere at the venue was electric, all teams’ had their fingers on their buzzers. CLC hit the buzzer on the 1st question only to get it wrong and was put in the unenviable position of having 8 teams ahead of them. NLSIU hit the buzzer 5 times, GNLU attempted three, Ramjas College attempted one question, while the leaders – SLS, Pune – did not attempt a single question. The string of correct answers from NLSIU’s Jeydev C S and Abhishek Choudhary lifted them into 3rd position, Ramjas College’s Ashish Kr. Singh and Abhishek Paliwal came in second, and Karan Kamath and Amey Pilay of SLS, Pune hung on to their lead from the first four rounds to win the Conquest 2017 National Finals.
ConQuest 2017 ended with speeches from Dr Father Jose C.C of Christ University, Mr K. Jairaj, Former Additional Chief Secretary of Government of Karnataka; Dona John from Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom and Sudhir Krishnaswamy, managing trustee at CLPR. The Chief Guest, K. Jairaj, handed the National Champions trophy and the 30,000 INR cash prize to SLS, Pune.
ConQuest 2017 was presented by the Centre for Law and Policy Research, Bangalore. The South Asia Regional Office of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom supported the Quiz and the prizes and trophies were sponsored by Mr.Arvind P. Datar, Sr. Advocate, Madras High Court. Walnut Knowledge Solutions was the Knowledge Partner and School of Law, Christ University was the National Finals Partner.