Two Indian-Americans teen spell history

Children of Indian origin in the United States again excelled as Sriram Hathwar and Ansun Sujoe were declared co-champions in the prestigious Scripps National Spelling Bee contest for only the fourth time in the bee's 89-year history.

Indian Americans, who have won the championship eleven times in the last 16 years, swept the top three spots this year as they did in the previous two years.

This year 281 spellers from eight countries competed for the coveted title in the national championship sponsored by English-language newspapers and educational foundations in the US. The contestants spell out a broad selection of words with increasing degree of difficulty testing one's vocabulary and usage.

"The competition was against the dictionary, not against each other," Sriram said after both were showered with confetti onstage after being declared joint winners for the first time since 1962. "I'm happy to share this trophy with him."

"Whatever," said Sujoe, 13, 7th grader from Fort Worth, Texas, as the seconds ticked down at the contest at the National Harbour Thursday night.

He couldn't get the word, "feuilleton," out of his mouth, but he spelled it correctly.

Sujoe shared the trophy with Sriram, 14, the lone repeat finalist of Painted Post, New York. His last correct spelling was "stichomythia."

The duo spelling victory for Indian-Americans for the seventh time in a row shared the title and a $30,000 scholarship. The last co-champions were in 1962. Before that joint winners were declared in 1950 and 1957.

In the final-round duel, Ansun and Sriram were both named champions after spelling a dozen words correctly in a row and nearly exhausting the 25 designated championship words.

Earlier, Sriram opened the door to an upset by Ansun after he misspelled "corpsbruder," a close comrade.

But Ansun was unable to take the title because he got "antegropelos," which means waterproof leggings, wrong.

The youngest finalist Tejas Muthusamy, 11, said he'd return home ready to change his studying routine for future competitions.

"Now I'll prepare more for the finals, and try to go through more esoteric words," Muthusamy said, minutes after misspelling

"hallenkirche" was eliminated from the contest.

According to Spelling Bee Sriram, when not studying spelling, plays the oboe, piano and chess to keep his mind stimulated.

Because he has been to the Scripps National Spelling Bee four times already, Sriram once produced a TEDx talk about his experiences in the Bee.

He previously competed in the Bee in 2008, 2009, 2011 when he tied for 6th place, and 2013 when he placed 3rd.

Ansun is so musically gifted that he not only plays piano, guitar and bassoon, he also has perfect pitch.

Ansun made his second trip to the Scripps National Spelling Bee this year. He also participated in 2013.

Six Indian American youngsters made it among 12 finalists after top contender Vanya Shivashankar of Olathe, Kansas, was eliminated in the semi-finals Thursday.

Vanya,12, a three-time finalist whose older sister was the 2009 bee winner, correctly spelled both words onstage but didn't get a high enough score on two computerised spelling and vocabulary tests to advance.

Last year's winner, New York middle-schooler Arvind Mahankali, was the sixth Indian American in a row to take the title and a $30,000 scholarship.

(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)