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Mimamsa was started by IISER Pune in the year 2009, the Faculty founding member being Dr. Sutirth Dey. It aimed at creating a unique set of questions that focused on concepts and their interdependence in order to explain the diverse range of phenomena around us. In this endeavour, Mimamsa strives to convey the implicit beauty of science. Over the years the means of implementing this philosophy has been honed to give rise to one of the Nation’s toughest science quiz. The fact that Mimamsa has gained National acclaim and renown is substantiated by the results of the quiz over the years. It has expanded to encompass the entire country over the years.
Contents
History
Mimamsa was started in the year 2009. It was the brainchild of Dr. Sutirth Dey, along with several students who felt that science could be explored beyond the classroom. The philosophy of Mimamsa is embodied in the name itself, which means critical inquiry and investigation. The team wanted to break the mould of trivia-based quizzes and encourage participants to question their understanding along with their knowledge. Mimamsa is an undergraduate level quiz, for students studying in 1st to 3rd years of any undergraduate course in the Sciences, engineering or medicine streams.
2009
The idea for Mimamsa was conceptualised in September 2008. The first edition, which took place in January and February 2009 included only colleges from Pune, though a college from Hyderabad also participated. The prelims had no online registration process and included only on the spot entries. The Mains were planned to have 4 finalists, a tradition that has been continued till date. Five colleges participated, out of which the finalists were: Fergusson College, Institute of Bioinformatics and Biotechnology (IBB), Garware College, and Wadia College. Institute of Bioinformatics and Biotechnology, Pune emerged as the runner-up in Mimamsa 2009 and Fergusson College, Pune emerged as the winner.
2010
Mimamsa 2010 followed the same pattern as that of the previous year. It was expanded to the cities of Mumbai, Nasik and Hyderabad, in addition to Pune. The prelims witnessed a dozen teams competing for the top 4 positions, and 50 participants in the individual category for the top 5 spots. Institute of Bioinformatics and Biotechnology, Pune again emerged as the winner in Mimamsa 2010. The individual winner was Yashoda Chandorkar from Fergusson College, Pune.
2011
Mimamsa 2011 followed the same pattern as Mimamsa 2009, with the individual entries being scrapped. The centres were extended the same as 2010, i.e. Mumbai, Nasik Hyderabad and Pune. Out of 84 teams in the prelims, BITS Pilani Hyderabad, Osmania Medical College, Fergusson College and University of Hyderabad made it to the top four finalists and were selected for the Mimamsa mains. Osmania Medical College of Hyderabad emerged as the winner in Mimamsa 2011.
2012
Mimamsa 2012 was expanded to cover nine cities all over India. The centres were Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi, Mumbai, Nagpur, Kolkata and Hyderabad, in addition to the host, Pune. 142 teams participated in the prelims. The team comprising students of the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, emerged as the winners of Mimamsa 2012.
2013
Mimamsa 2013 covered seven cities across the country, Pune, Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Mumbai. IISc Bengaluru emerged as the winner.
2014
Mimamsa 2014 like the previous year covered seven cities and once again IISc Bengaluru emerged as the winner.
2015
Mimamsa 2015 Prelims saw a participation of 250 teams in 9 centres across India – Pune, Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai, Ahmedabad and Thiruvananthapuram. IISc Bengaluru emerged as the winner.
General Overview of the Quiz
The prelims generally take place during the second week of January and cover all the four subjects: Mathematics, physics, chemistry and biology. The question paper is designed for an hour, with equal weight given to all the four subjects.The mains are generally held during the second week of February and spread over two consecutive days, comprising questions in all the four subjects. The questions designed in the mains, scrutinise every possible aspect of scientific reasoning and thus are divided into different categories.
The outline of rules of Mimamsa 2015
The brief thought questions consisted of four minutes of thinking time, one minute presentation time and were marked out of ten points. The deep thought questions are based on random choice and have seven minutes of compulsory thinking time and two minutes of optional thinking time. The presentation of the answer was to be made in three minutes and had an exhaustive marking scheme of 25 points. The 'oculomotor' round is a buzzer round wherein all questions are based on audio-visual cues with a plus ten for a correct answer and a negative five points for an incorrect answer. The rapid fire round tests the speed and logical flow involved in arriving at an answer. The teams can select the order of subjects in which they want to answer and can spend at most two minutes on any subject. A team is required to answer a minimum of three questions out of five within two minutes before moving on to the next subject. The total time for each team was six minutes. The exposition session comprises all the teams presenting their choice of topics. The exposition is restricted for thirty minutes and is judged based upon the eloquence of the speakers, and the other teams are marked based on the quality of the question they pose.
A Behind the scenes account
Q: What was the philosophy behind Mimamsa?
Darshan Joshi (IISER Pune, 2007 batch, BS-MS student): Firstly, during its first few editions, Mimamsa was just one activity of Science club, which was a brainchild of a group of students (2007 batch). Actually, the philosophy/vision of Mimamsa is encrypted in the name itself which literally means investigation, inquiry, in-depth analysis etc. Through our weekly science club talks, we constantly enjoyed this philosophy and we wanted to come up with a science competition based on this principle rather than the usual 'quiz' philosophy which does not ask for one to think. That is the reason why we have Mimamsa spread over 2 days! So the idea was very simple: plan a competition which will test the understanding of science rather than scientific information. This is why questions in Mimamsa are so different. At least my personal philosophy was that the questions should, of course, test the understanding but should not be difficult/technical rather they must be such that if someone fails to solve it, then he/she must still appreciate the solution and its simplicity. It is not difficult to make tough questions but then the end result is only demotivating to ones who can't solve it. So the idea was through the process of solving the question one must develop a better understanding of science - it must teach you something! Then there were other technical parts such as rounds, marking etc. Each round had its purpose as most of the names suggest. And as you know the uniqueness lies in the fact that each team gets to answer each question. Again here the philosophy was that we wanted to have a discussion and investigation rather than just a right/wrong answer. Of course, this makes marking extremely difficult and that is why we invented our own scheme - the exhaustive marking scheme.