After 5 golds among 5 participants, Indian team members recount experience at IPhO

Editor’s note: On 29 July, the Indian contingent at the International Physics Olympiad 2018 **created history** after all five participating students won gold medals for the country. This was the first time in 21 years of the competition that all five members of the Indian team have returned with a gold medal. “If you talk in terms of cricket, India’s strike rate in the International Physics Olympiad since 1998 has been 100 percent, where every student has won at least one medal — be it gold, silver, or bronze,” Shirish Pathare, chief scientific officer at the Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education (HBCSE), **said** . The institute oversaw the Indian contingent’s preparation for the event held in Lisbon. The winners included Mumbai’s Bhaskar Gupta, Lay Jain from Kota, Rajkot’s Nishant Abhangi, Pawan Goyal from Jaipur and Siddharth Tiwary from Kolkata. Here we have two of them recount their experience at the global event and their preparations towards it for tech2: Lay Jain: We couldn’t believe we created history On a windy night in south-eastern Mumbai, as it was getting late for dinner, I switched on the stopwatch and started taking thermocouple readings, determined to explore the Curie-Wiess Law. I spent that night only doing calculations, plotting graphs and analysing the results. In this camp, we had exhaustive theoretical and experimental sessions. And because of that, there was no scope for getting bored — the lab and library had too much for us to discover. Neither was there time to get tired. Here I could discover the fields of study that fascinated me and the subjects for which I could devote countless hours. Such was the Orientation Cum Selection Camp (OCSC) 2017 — the third stage for selection into the International Physics Olympiad (IPhO) 2017. Once I was selected for it, I participated in the IPhO 2017 held in Indonesia and won a gold medal. The experience was life changing. I got to make friends with students of my age and with similar interests from all over the globe. I also got to visit new places and learn about different cultures during that visit. I felt such a strong sense of nostalgia that when I returned this time that I knew I must apply for the IPhO 2018, from scratch, again. After you clear the first two stages, preparing for the third one, is really fun. You are exposed to interesting and innovative experiments — something that we don’t see in high schools. You have the opportunity of attending lectures by eminent professors and scientists. And of course, you get to study interesting topics beyond the normal coursework. At HBCSE, the environment is very peculiar — here, you have the top 35 students from India, all under one roof. Here I had theoretical and practical examinations to appear for. And as it turned out, I was among the top 5 students at the OCSC, which got me selected to represent my country once again, this time at the 49th International Physics Olympiad 2018, at Lisbon, Portugal. We departed after a 10-day-long ‘pre-departure training’ in Mumbai. Our stay in Portugal lasted for a total of 9 days. We had two five hour exams, and for the rest of the days we were led on beautiful excursions to different places in the country. [caption id=“attachment_4876091” align=“alignnone” width=“1024”] Left to right: Lay Jain, Siddharth Tiwary, Nishant Abhangi, Pawan Goyal and Bhaskar Gupta. Twitter/@HBSCE_TIFR[/caption] On the penultimate day of our tour, we had the closing ceremony. The cold auditorium was packed with delegations from 87 countries apart from chief guests, and we hoped, with some surprises yet to come. Through the ceremony, we were on the edge of our chairs, eagerly waiting to hear the results. And when the names were announced, we burst with joy. It was utterly unbelievable that all five of us have received gold medals in the competition. We could not believe that we created history. This, my friends, is the story of my journey to the two International Physics Olympiads. Pawan Goyal: After last year’s silver, I was determined to work even harder I had a keen interest in Physics right since Class 6 when Physics was offered as a separate subject for first time, but knew nothing about the Olympiads until a year later when I got enrolled in one of the institutes in Rajasthan’s Kota. All these Olympiads fascinated me and I wanted to go to all of them although I knew it wasn’t going to be easy. But I didn’t let myself get scared by the competition and just kept working hard. Finally in Class 9 I made to the final level of International Junior Science Olympiad (IJSO) and won the gold medal for India. In IJSO, I learned about the basic experiments of Physics relating to lasers and lenses, which cemented my interest in Physics. It was then that I fixed my next goal: to represent India in IPhO. I started preparing for IPhO at the end of Class 10 alongside my IIT preparation, and spent most my free time doing Physics. Finally my efforts showed results and I got selected to represent India in IPhO when I was in Class 11, only competing with Class 12 students, and finally won the silver medal in IPhO held in Indonesia in 2017. But winning a silver medal left me little disappointed and dejected. In spite of all odds and my sadness, I overcame the tough times and decided to work harder in order to win a gold medal the next year. I worked more on my Physics in the subsequent months and again got selected to represent India in IPhO which was to be held in Portugal. But this time, armed with my experience from last year’s event and my hard work, I finally won a gold medal in 49th IPhO held in Lisbon, Portugal. Along with this, I topped the Indian squad and bagged 7th position worldwide. Also this was the first time in history that all 5 Indian students bagged a gold medal each at the IPhO. [caption id=“attachment_4876541” align=“alignnone” width=“4608”] The five Indian participants on their Portugal trip during the International Physics Olympiad. Image courtesy: Pawan Goyal[/caption] An account of my journey to IPhO would be incomplete without talking about HBCSE. HBCSE is the main body responsible for carrying out Olympiad-related activities in India, and has a body consisting of multiple professors, administrators and scientists in this effort. They have a very modern laboratory, equipped with the latest and most sophisticated instruments. They trained me in both experimental and theoretical skills to the standards required at international level. They also conducted a two week camp for our preparation before we left for IPhO, which helped me gain confidence and eventually win a gold medal. My memories of the event in Portugal are of course filled with admiration for the event. At the international level, we have two competitions: one is an experimental one and other is theoretical, each of 5 hours’ duration. The former is 20 marks worth and later 30 marks. This year, the experimental exam was very, very long and nobody could complete it in the time given.  Most of the participants could complete only 50-60 percent of the paper. But the theoretical exam was very easy and most of my team members got more than 29 out of 30. Finally, the cutoff for gold was set at 35 and we all made through, creating history. The IPhO provides you a platform were you meet students from across the world of same age and interest, and learn about their thoughts and cultures. There I made many new friends from multiple countries, from the United States and Germany to Singapore and Indonesia. There, I came to know about the education systems and cultures of these countries and was fascinated by their intelligence. IPhO provided me a platform to be exposed to a community, the association with which, I am sure, will last throughout my life.