The national finale of the fifth edition of Print Olympiad, considered to be India’s biggest talent hunt in printing, was held at the Deenbandhu Chhotu Ram University of Science and Technology, Murthal, Haryana. The contest was evaluated by a panel of five eminent judges from Greece, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Bhutan and Bangladesh.

The Offset Printers Association (OPA), Ludhiana, in association with the universities and printing institutions in India, has been organising the Print Olympiad since 2014. During the preliminary rounds, the competition selects the best print students among the four zones (East, West, North and South) and thereafter, during the national finale, the winner is selected from the top four candidates. 

TKS Lakshmi Priya. professor and head, Printing Technology at Avinashilingam Institute for Women, said, “The regional level competition for each zone, to select the top student of the region, was held online in the last few months. There were two preliminary tests where the registered students were given a set of 50 questions with multiple choice answers. Later, the selected top three students of the region participated in the regional finale, where they were given five topics, one each by different jury members and the students were to speak extemporaneously, for a specific time, on any of the topics. The four zonal finalists qualified for the national final.”

During the national final, the contestants were made to speak on a technical topic for five minutes, followed by a Q&A. 

Vishwa Sree of South Zone impressed the judges with her speech as well as during the Q&A session. 

Anubhava Shiksharthi, advisor of the project, said, “The curtain raiser for Print Olympiad 2022 was held on 25 February in virtual mode. Since then, 12 competitions of various levels were organised online and seven universities/printing institutions and more than 10 printing teachers from various parts of the country were involved in hosting the fifth edition of the Print Olympiad. There were 16 judges from India and abroad who selected the top print students from each region from more than 789 registered students from various institutions across the country.”