Indian Sudoku Championship 2012

The Indian Sudoku Championship 2012, organised by Logic Masters India (LMI), in association with Times Of India, was held in July, 2012. Participation is free of cost and everyone is invited to participate in the event irrespective of age. There are no prerequisites/requirements for participation. Top competitors will represent India at the World Sudoku Championship 2012 which will be held in Croatia in October, 2012.

There were regional rounds in four different cities and the top four contestants from each city qualify for the national finals.

1st July, 2012: Bengaluru Regional Round
Good to see 1000+ participants.

New Article

Qualifiers

1. Jaipal Reddy
2. Rakesh Rai
3. Asha Siddaiah
4. Rajesh Kumar

Congrats to the top 4 who qualify for the national finals.
Jaipal and Asha are my WSC 2010 team-mates, Rakesh is an IPC 2012 finalist and Rajesh, one of the most experienced Indian at the World Championships.

8th July, 2012: Chennai Regional Round
Again good to have 1000+ participants.

News Article

Qualifiers

1. Sumit Bothra
2. R Thejesvini
3. Raman Garimella
4. Zalak Ghetia

Congrats to the top 4 who qualify for the national finals.
Sumit is my WSC 2011 team-mate. Nice to see Raman back. Its also good to see 2 females among the top 4.

14th July, 2012: Delhi Regional Round
Good to have 1000+ participants.

News Article

Qualifiers

1. Ritesh Gupta
2. Himani Shah
3. Akash Doulani
4. Saroj Kumar Sahu

Congrats to the top 4 who qualify for the national finals.
Ritesh, a three-time national champion, is my WSC 2009 and WSC 2010 team-mate. Nice to see Himani back after a break. Akash is an ISC 2011 finalist. Good to have another new face, Saroj Kumar Sahu.

15th July, 2012: Mumbai Regional Round
This was leading to be the toughest of the four rounds. And without doubt, it was. 1000+ participants again, but many good players and previous finalists present.

News Article

Qualifiers

1. Rohan Rao
2. Gaurav Korde
3. Dr. Omkar Hendre
4. Himanshu Mittal

Congrats to Gaurav, Omkar and Himanshu.

Due to the big pool of possible players who could make it to the top 4, it was important to do well in both the rounds. I finished the Classic round in 16mins, but after Gaurav, who finished in 14mins. I had to beat Gaurav by at least 2mins in the Variants round. I finished the Variants in 9mins whereas Gaurav took 18mins.

Gaurav and me had a good lead over the rest. Good performance by Omkar and Himanshu to make it. Manoj Arora, who stood 5th with an impressive result, missed the top 4 due to a silly mistake. Tejal Phatak, who stood 7th, being the best female performer, also missed the top 4 due to swapping of two digits.

Competition was tough, and one way or another, there had to be good players who would not qualify.

22nd July, 2012: Indian Sudoku Championship Finals
The top 16 who qualified for the national finals, battled it out for a place in the top 4.

Unlike last year where many good players could not make it to the finals, this was one that was looking to be a tough competition.

Round 1: Sprint
16 sudokus, all 6x6, classic and variants, 25 minutes. It was good start since I was the first to finish with 6 minutes left on the clock. Gaurav came in 2nd with 3 minutes left. It surely helps to start on a high when defending your title :-)

(Results were announced at the end)
Unfortunately, I made a grave mistake in one of the sudokus, and lost 30 (+60 bonus) points, a total of 90 points. Gaurav scored 280, Ritesh 250 and I, 220.

Round 2: Classics
8 Sudokus of varying difficulty, 40 minutes. I finished first again with 12 minutes on the clock. Gaurav and Sumit were close behind with 11 minutes.

Round 3: Mix
This was the make-or-break round for most players. 8 variants, 60 minutes, and 650 points. The biggest round. I was certainly disappointed in not being able to finish all sudokus with ample time in hand. I managed to shade the odd-even cells in Parity, but I kept going wrong while solving it.
Well, ironically, everyone had a bad round. Gaurav could have taken a lead but made an error in Outside, thus, pulling him down further.

Round 4: Surprise
The rules of this round was given right before the round began. Beautiful sudoku. Perfectly executed, and exceptional feedback from all players. It was just the perfect round to end the championship.
4D Sudoku: Place the 36 cells in the grid such that every row/column and 2x3 box contains each number, each alphabet, each colour and each shape exactly once.

A mechanical round which was certainly well planned and implemented. 13 of the 15 finalists managed to finish it within time, with Sumit being the fastest, 30 seconds before me.

Final Results

1. Rohan Rao (Mumbai) - 1548
2. Sumit Bothra (Kolkata) - 1475
3. Gaurav Korde (Mumbai) - 1420
4. Rakesh Rai (Chennai) - 1354

Complete Results

I won my 3rd ISC title on a trot (equaled Ritesh's hat-trick of 2007-2008-2009). I also won my 3rd IPC-ISC double. I'm happy to have won my 6th title in a row, and hope to do well at the World Sudoku Championship 2012, Croatia.

Thanks to Times Of India and Logic Masters India for organising this championship on such a huge scale. Great sudokus as usual by Amit and Deb.

Personally, this was the team I had predicted when ISC started, so I'm glad it turned out to be right as I believe we have the best four sudoku solvers of the country and we hope to improve India's performance this year.

NOTE: I will be regularly updating my blog about puzzles and championships, and will be actively participating in forum activities, but I'm taking a (much-needed) break from solving in a competitive mode.

Indian Sudoku Championship 2011

The Indian Sudoku Championship 2011 will consist of 14 regional rounds held in the months of January to March 2011. The top 3 from each of these regional rounds will be invited for the national finals on 11-Jun-2011. The team which will represent India at the World Sudoku Championship will be selected on the basis of the performance in the Indian Sudoku Championship National Final.

Championship Page
Forum

There are several ways in which you could qualify for a position in the National Finals.

You could be amongst the top 3 at one of the regional rounds.
You could be amongst the top 15 from the Online Qualifying round which will be held on date.

The 14 regional rounds will be held as a part of the college festivals in reputed colleges in different colleges across the country. The regional rounds will be held in the cities of Mumbai, Chennai, Kharagpur, Rourkela, Goa, Guwahati, Bangalore, Kanpur, Hyderabad, Ranchi, Bhopal, Delhi, Roorkee and Pilani in the months from January to March. The regional round finals will be held between the top 60 participants from the region. The 60 finalists will be selected from Regional Prelims which will be open to all participants. For more details regarding the venue and dates of the regional round nearest to you please have a look at the Schedule.

Download Instruction Booklet (Online Qualification)
Download Puzzle Booklet (Online Qualification)

The regional rounds went really well and it was nice to see so many participants in the online round too.

List of Qualifiers

The national finals was held on 11th June at Community Hall inside DRDO Complex, CV Raman Nagar, Bengaluru (Bangalore)

Download Instruction Booklet

10th June, 2011
I took a flight to Bengaluru and reached Rajesh's house around 6pm. After a brief nap, I spent some time with Rajesh's family and relaxed. Last year, I won the Indian Sudoku Championship (and the Indian Puzzle Championship) and going into this year's finals being the defending champion was not the easiest thing for me. There were a lot of first-timers due to the regional rounds and the regular group of good players were anyways there. These were my thoughts about some of the players

Gaurav Korde: Has been away for a while, but a great performance in Beijing shows how he can pull himself at critical times.
Rakesh Rai: Has been very consistent and I believed him to be the dark horse.
Rishi Puri: Last year's runner-up, who has been in tremendous form lately with his recent exploits in Beijing.
Ritesh Gupta: 3-time national champion would be raring to get his title back.
Sumit Bothra: Out of practise, but can deliver when needed.
Tejal Phatak: Has been consistently rising and offline events are her strength.

It was a big disappointment when Rishi had to cancel his trip. His absence at the finals meant a pillar went missing. Some people felt I should've been happy since a big contender of the title had pulled out. But I like competition and I've always enjoyed a fight, irrespective of the result. Adding to Rishi's absence, Rakesh and Jaipal too pulled out at the last moment thus thinning the competition to a great extent. I was very disappointed but I couldn't do much about it.

11th June, 2011

The competition hall was huge and as Sumit mentioned 'It gave the feel of a puzzle championship'. I felt comfortable and I was hoping to make it in the Indian team at least, if not win the championship.

Round 1
Download Puzzle Booklet
It was a perfect beginning for me. I was able to finish the round with a 1-minute time bonus. I was shell-shocked when the results came out to see I already had a 95-point lead over 2nd place Tejal and a 190-point lead over 3rd place Ritesh.

Round 2
Download Puzzle Booklet
I finished 6 of the 7 sudokus in 50 minutes and had 10 minutes to complete Odd-Even Frame. It was disappointing to miss the last one, but good enough to top the round and extend my lead.

Round 3
Download Puzzle Booklet
I never expected to complete this round, but I had a big advantage by finishing Equal Sum and Multiplication Table within 25 minutes. I even checked every 2x2 region of Equal Sum to make sure I didn't go wrong. I finished all the sudokus with a 5-minute bonus and this was when I was sure of retaining my ISC title.

Round 4
Download Puzzle Booklet
I wanted to win ISC by topping all four rounds and it went exactly as I would've liked. I spent more than 10 minutes on the 'very difficult' Touchy but couldn't crack it. I got the first Classic wrong with a silly error, but I topped the round with 350, just 20 more than Tejal!

Results

1. Rohan Rao (Mumbai) - 1895
2. Ritesh Gupta (Delhi) - 1155
3. Sumit Bothra (Kolkata) - 1140
4. Tejal Phatak (Mumbai) - 1105
5. Gaurav Korde (Mumbai) - 970
6. Prasanna Seshadri (Mumbai) - 765
7. Harmeet Singh (Bengaluru) - 740
8. Himanshu Mittal (Delhi) - 725
9. Akash Doulani (Kolkata) - 710
10. Rajesh Kumar (Bengaluru) - 670

Complete Results

Sumit Bothra and Deb Mohanty

Ritesh Gupta and Deb Mohanty

Rohan Rao and Deb Mohanty

Relieved, excited and happy, I won ISC 2011 and retained my title. I knew we were going to be given certificates but I had no idea there were trophies for the top 3. The certificates and trophies were both wonderful!

Looking at the results, Gaurav Korde had a disappointing day. Most of us expected him to be in the top 3. Tejal Phatak performed extremely well and so did debutant Prasanna Seshadri. Harmeet Singh had a fantastic weekend, too.

The sudokus were exceptionally good, especially Round 3. I felt the 6x6 Linked Sudokus of Round 1 were slightly tougher than what it should've been.
I liked Odd-Even View from Round 2, Mulitplication Table from Round 3 and Classic-Diagonal from Round 4.
All the rounds were well-timed, without any problems.

It was a wonderful event, had excellent puzzles, was organised infallibly and ended on a successful note.

The entire event was co-ordinated by one man, Deb Mohanty, who spent a lot of time and effort in ensuring the success of the event. Not only did he organise the event, he created every one of the sudokus of the championship. I wonder how he managed to do this all by himself. He must be super-man!

Credits

I thank Rajesh Kumar, Deb Mohanty and their families for giving me accomodation. Special thanks to Deb Mohanty and his team (view credits) for organising this wonderful event which went very smoothly and was a huge success.

Indian Sudoku Championship 2010 - Finals

The top 40 from the online rounds held on 3rd and 9th January and the top 30 from the offline preliminary round held on 23rd January qualified for the finals of the Indian Sudoku Championship 2010 at Techfest, IIT-B.

Download Instruction Booklet

Round 1: Linked Classics - 35 mins - 350 points + Time Bonus

Download Puzzle Booklet
Download Solution Booklet
The puzzles were quite easy (compared to Deb's standards ;-) ). I was the first to complete it and I did in 20mins with a 15min time bonus followed closely by Rishi Puri who completed just one minute later. Many others completed the puzzles and got time bonuses too.

Round 2: Samurai Sudoku - 45 mins - 450 points + Time Bonus

Download Puzzle Booklet
Download Solution Booklet
A typical Deb-type puzzle. It was too tough to do within 45mins. Rishi again did a phenomenal job by completing the sudoku within 45mins. No one else completed it completely. I could solve only the Diagonal and Irregular regions.

Round 3: Mixed Bag - 45 mins - 550 points

Download Puzzle Booklet
Download Solution Booklet
A tough round for everyone. I solved the Extra-Region, Roman, Fortress and Inequality. I made a stupid error in Distance :-( Most of the other participants solved 2-3 puzzles out of 6.

Round 4: Mechanical Sudoku - 35 mins - 200 points + Time Bonus

Download Puzzle Booklet
Download Solution Booklet
Undoubtedly, this was the puzzle that spoiled everyone's mood... well, except mine :-) I was the first to complete the puzzle and did it with 6mins of time bonus. It was tough and very very interesting. Hats off to Amit and Deb for this superb puzzle!

After these four rounds, the standings were as follows:

1. Rohan Rao - 1235

2. Rishi Puri - 1185

3. Rakesh Rai - 1030

4. Jaipal Reddy - 775

4. Himani Shah - 775

6. Asha Siddaiah - 765

7. Gaurav Korde - 730

8. Ritesh Gupta - 720

8. Nidhi Sarawagi - 720

Complete Results

Semi-Final
Download Puzzle Booklet
Download Solution Booklet

These 9 participants then played the Semi-Final. It was great fun. Rishi and me were going hand-in-hand until the last No Even Neighbours Sudoku. Its the variation that I (and Tejal Phatak) have created myself which got me hooked up long enough for Rishi to complete before me : Gaurav raced through the puzzles to finish a deserving 3rd. Then the fun. Rakesh, Jaipal, Himani, Asha and Ritesh were all on the 6th puzzle, wanting the 4th place to qualify for the last final round. Ritesh made it!

So, the standings after the semi-final were as follows:

1. Rishi Puri (19:36)

2. Rohan Rao (20:26)

3. Gaurav Korde (21:48)

4. Ritesh Gupta (33:44)

5. Asha Siddaiah

6. Rakesh Rai

7. Jaipal Reddy

8. Himani Shah

9. Nidhi Sarawagi

Final
Download Puzzle Booklet
Download Solution Booklet

The top 4 qualified for the finals which were 3 puzzles to be solved on a white-board with a marker pen. It was difficult for me due to my height :

1st puzzle was a Classic Sudoku. Rishi was first to complete in 3m 21s, followed by Gaurav and Ritesh. I was last at 5m 45s :

2nd puzzle was an Extra-Region Irregular Sudoku. Rishi was again first to complete followed by Gaurav and Ritesh. I was last again and finished 4 secs before the end-time (15mins). The great news (for me) was, Rishi unfortunately left one cell blank and Gaurav and Ritesh made an error! So, I was the only one to solve it correctly! :-)

3rd puzzle was a Snail Sudoku. Rishi completed his hat-trick by finishing first again, followed closely by Gaurav and me. This time Ritesh was last! ;-)

Based on the number of puzzles solved and the time taken to solve them, the final standings were as follows:

1. Rohan Rao (3 Correct - 52:32)

2. Rishi Puri (2 Correct - 49:06)

3. Gaurav Korde (2 Correct - 52:18)

4. Ritesh Gupta (2 Correct - 61:59)

Complete Results

It was great to meet the best puzzlers of the country, most of them part of LM community on orkut. It was a good learning experience and a fun-filled strong competition.

Thanks to Amit Sowani and Deb Mohanty for creating some great and fun puzzles. Thanks to Techfest and IIT-B for hosting this event and making it a grand success. Thanks to all the organisers and others involved.

Hope to have many more championships like these :-)

Indian Sudoku Championship 2010

Indian Sudoku Championship 2010
Sudoku, dubbed as the hottest puzzle sensation since the Rubiks Cube gained worldwide popularity in early 2005. The first World Sudoku championship (WSC) was held in March 2006 in Lucca, Italy. The 5th WSC will be held in April 2010 in Philadelphia, USA. Logic Masters India in association with TechFest at IIT Bombay, invites you to test your logical skills in the Indian Sudoku Championship and get an opportunity to represent India at the WSC. All resident Indian nationals, irrespective of age, can participate in Indian Sudoku Championship. The sudoku-solving skills of contestants will be tested through the regular Classic sudokus as well as different sudoku variations which appear in the WSCs. Top rankers at the Indian Sudoku Championship will be eligible to represent India at the 5th World Sudoku Championship to be held in Philadelphia in April 2010.

Rules and Regulations
The Indian Sudoku Championship will consist of two online rounds on 3rd and 9th January 2010 to select the top 30 participants for the finals. There will also be an elimination round to select the top 30 from the on the spot participants on 23rd January 2010. The finals for these 60 participants will be held on 24th January 2010. Detailed instructions are available here

Championship page
For further details regarding the Indian Sudoku Championship please visit our championship page

Registration
All participants will have to register at the TechFest website to get their participant ID here.

Download Instruction Booklet

Download Puzzle Booklet 1 (Day 1)
Password is wa5endul
Download Solution Booklet 1 (Day 1)
Download Puzzle Booklet 2 (Day 1)
Password is sh9pylyj
Download Solution Booklet 2 (Day 1)
Download Puzzle Booklet 3 (Day 1)
Password is bu4tabeb
Password is Solution Booklet 3 (Day 1)

Download Puzzle Booklet 1 (Day 2)
Password is dskn7vytps
Download Solution Booklet 1 (Day 2)
Download Puzzle Booklet 2 (Day 2)
Password is njtnr2qdbh
Download Solution Booklet 2 (Day 2)
Download Puzzle Booklet 3 (Day 2)
Password is bdjms8bh3k
Download Solution Booklet 3 (Day 2)

The list of puzzles that appeared for the championship are:

Round 1
1. Classic Sudoku

Round 2
1. Odd-Even Sudoku
2. Diagonal Sudoku
3. Frame Sudoku
4. Sudoku XV
5. Irregular Sudoku
6. Consecutive Sudoku

Round 3
1. Outside Sudoku
2. Quadruple Sudoku
3. Magic Square Sudoku
4. No Knight Sudoku
5. Group Sum Sudoku
6. Toroidal Sudoku

Results

1. Jan Mrozowski (Poland) - 1970
2. Jakub Ondrousek (Czech Republic) - 1910
3. Rohan Rao (India) - 1875
4. Jan Novotny (Czech Republic) - 1840
5. Nikola Zivanovic (Serbia) - 1730
6. Rishi Puri (India) - 1725
7. Ritesh Gupta (India) - 1655
8. Chen Cen (China) - 1585
9. Jakub Hrazdira (Czech Republic) - 1550
10. Rakhel Parida (India) - 1435
10. Puneet Goenka (India) - 1435

Indian results

1. Rohan Rao - 1875
2. Rishi Puri - 1725
3. Ritesh Gupta - 1655
4. Rakhel Parida - 1435
4. Puneet Goenka - 1435
6. Gaurav Korde - 1360
7. Priyanka Gupta - 1355
8. Pooja Gaddyan - 1345
9. Neha Sharma - 1295
9. Pratik Poddar - 1295
9. Gnyanendra Kumar - 1295

Complete Results

There were totally 169 participants.
Congrats to everyone!

Reader's Digest Sudoku

Indian Sudoku Championship 2009

Indian Sudoku Championship 2009

All resident Indian nationals, irrespective of age, can participate in Indian Sudoku Championship. The championship is open to participants across the globe. Participants from other countries are most welcomed to participate in the ISC. The Championship was an online test on March 14-15, 2009. The sudoku-solving skills of contestants was tested using different sudoku variations which appear in the World Sudoku Championships. Top rankers at the Indian Sudoku Championship will be eligible to represent India at the 4th World Sudoku Championship to be held in Zilina, Slovakia in April 2009.

Rules and Regulations
The Indian Sudoku Championship consisted of 3 parts each of 45 minutes. All three parts of the test was held twice on 14th and 15th March 2009 to account for network problems for the participants. The best of two scores for each part across both days will be counted in the final score for each participant. The schedule:

Day1 - 14th March
Classic Sudoku (14:00 - 14:45 IST)
Basic variants relay (15:00 - 15:45 IST)
New variants (16:00 - 16:45 IST)

Day2 - 15th March
Classic Sudoku (10:00 - 10:45 IST)
Basic variants relay (11:00 - 11:45 IST)
New variants (12:00 - 12:45 IST)

Download Instruction Booklet

Download Puzzle Booklet 1 (Day 1)
Password is D1R1weD7JewgRD
Download Puzzle Booklet 2 (Day 1)
Password is D1R2PDFisUpdated
Download Puzzle Booklet 3 (Day 1)
Password is D1R3Ot6OsRajeA

Download Puzzle Booklet 1 (Day 2)
Password is D2R1uPp9pHyswA
Download Puzzle Booklet 2 (Day 2)
Password is D2R2bE7pYskYsl
Download Puzzle Booklet 3 (Day 2)
Password is D2R3fO3ooChiCd
Download Solution Booklet

The list of sudokus that appeared in the championship are:

Round 1: Classic Sudoku (45mins)
1. Classic Sudoku

Round 2: Basic Variants Relay (45mins)
1. Odd-Even Sudoku
2. XV Sudoku
3. Daigonal Sudoku
4. Extra Region Sudoku
5. Consecutive Sudoku
6. Irregular Sudoku
7. Frame Sudoku

Round 3: New Variants (45mins)
1. Blackout Sudoku
2. Dan Sudoku
3. Odd-Even Neighbours Sudoku
4. Odd-Even Skyscrapers Sudoku
5. Repeated Neighbours Sudoku
6. Toroidal Sudoku
7. Sum 16 Sudoku

Results

1. Ritesh Gupta - 1330
2. Gaurav Korde - 1190
3. Himanshu Mittal - 1045
4. Rohan Rao - 1040
5. Rajesh Kumar - 905
6. Lovely Krishna - 890
7. Tejal Phatak - 880
8. Jaipal Reddy - 870
9. Sumit Bothra - 785
10. Himani Shah - 745

Foreign participants

1. Chen Cen (China) - 1265
2. Jakub Hrazdira (Czech Republic) - 1180
3. Marie Benediktova (Czech Republic) - 1105
4. Bastien Vial-Jaime (France) - 1095
5. Branko Ceranic (Serbia) - 1055
6. Rubben (Romania) - 955
7. Jakub Ondrousek (Czech Republic) - 915
8. Ours Blanc (France) - 855
9. Jan Mrozowski (Poland) - 785
10. Nikola Zivanovic (Serbia) - 780

There were totally 76 Indian participants and 19 foreign participants.
Congrats to everyone!

For more details, visit Logic Masters India.