Robo Pundits make City proud

Tech kids

‘Robo Pundits,’ the team from the National Public School, Koramangala, scored 265 points trouncing the runner-up team from Mumbai, with a tally of 225 points at the First Lego League Tournament 2011.

The south regional round of the national-level robotics championship was held at SAP Labs, Whitefield, on January 29, 2011.

The victorious team comprised Ruchin Kulkarni, Ashwin Pandian, Sahil Punjabi, Ishan Bannerjee, Shankha Nag, and Abhijit Kashyap, all students of Class X. Rupam Bhattacharya and Ghanshyam guided the team. The competition was open to anyone in the age group of 9-16 and each team could have a maximum of ten members.

Kits provided

SAP Labs had provided special kits with Lego bricks, programmable processors, sensors and motors for assembling a robot to accomplish predefined missions.

Besides, a specially designed mat on which all the action takes place was provided.

The participants were judged on four parameters - team work, project presentation, robotics run, and technical skills.

Ruchin, who aspires to pursue computer science and engineering, says: "We had to give a presentation on a topic related to Biomedical engineering, which was this year's theme. It was a fun-filled exercise. We started in September 2010 when the tournament was announced."

Inspired by seniors

The students were inspired by their seniors who had also brought laurels to the City in designing robots. "They (seniors) told us to work hard and be sound in technical aspects. So, it was essentially our technical soundness and team work which saw us through," Ruchin explains.

Innovative skit

Ashwin agrees. "We were strong in our robot run as well as our presentation of the project. We had planned an innovative skit for our project presentation which was well appreciated by the judges."

Luckily, the team had the audience supporting it. "We really had the audience rooting for us. We had a theme song and our team spirit was terrific," Sahil notes.

The team is anxious to represent the country at the World Festival of First Lego League, 2011 to be held from April 27-30, at St Louis, Missouri, USA.

“The world championship will not be any different from what we did in the national tournament. But the fact that we will represent India had the adrenaline pumping," Ruchin said.