Margao September Monthly : 27/Sept/2026 – recap and results

QMs:Ira Prem & Siddhant Parab

Last night, because of a question by QM Siddhant,I went down a rabbit hole to find out what other ways humans today have found to speak to our descendants thousands of years later. Isn’t that what we do? Communicate, commemorate, speak across centuries in commandments, cave art, stories and rap music. We warn those who follow to pay heed to the pitfalls that we have seen and created, but we also ask them to stop and admire the wonders and beauty of our world. From the farthest known star to the 8 thousander peaks, we are here to witness them all.

Quizzing , at its core, is an act of observation. It can be a half-remembered story about an actor’s resilience in turning her facial injury into her calling card. It can be a memory of reading a reddit thread about Euler, or of watching an absurdly misogynistic comment in a Netflix documentary about football. We take note, and because we do so, we give credence to the world. "Come tell me what you see" ,a QM asks, "because this is what I see". We are endlessly curious of the known universe and the unknown too.

Ira and Siddhant made disparate quizzes in the two halves. But there was a common thread that tied their sets: they showed us what they observed and found interesting. Who knew hats could be so fascinating (by the way, a fascinator is also a type of head wear!). The Des-Pardes round was especially well made. Siddhant took us on a wonderfully whacky journey that included a dictator’s granddaughter selling Casios, and a whole religion created from the spiritual experience that is Coltrane’s jazz.

Both the QMs took us on a trip across space and time, across facts and fundas that caused scratched heads and also applause. And we in the audience admired the beauty of the questions, and how well clued they were. We raced to the next dopamine hit of the correct pounce. And we stopped for a minute , and observed what was and what will be.We answered the question:What do you see?

 

Results:

1^st place: Team 1: 255 points

Kaivalya Karkare, Paul Gatward, Ira Prem, Magali Vaz, Siddhant Parab, Shubhangi

2^nd place: Team 6: 250 points

Anirudh Kakodkar, Altamash Panjwany, Vilas Pavithran, Amey Parsekar, Ruchira Porob

3^rd place: Team 4: 230 points

Angeline Pradhan, Ajit Nair, Shreya Ramachandani, Viola Rodrigues, Annie Sen Gupta

4^th place: Team 5: 225 points

Sanjay Parab, Diksha Mandlik, Aastha Dua, Assis Sequeira, Ishan Kakodkar, Terrence D’Costa, Shujoy Dutta

5^th place: Team 3: 210 points

Srijit Kumar, Aabha Lal, Devika Shetty, Upesh Pradhan, Srishti Maruca, Shwetambari Parab

6^th place: Team 2: 205 points

Ira Almeida, Anjali Sengupta, Rajiv D’Silva, Karan Dhingra

 

 

SEQC Panjim October Quiz

Date: Sunday, 4th October 2026

Time: 5.00 pm

Venue: Goa Business School, Taleigao

Click here for map

QM: Nitish Wagle

Participation: Open to all

Irish Open 2026

Date: Sunday, 27th September 2026

Time: 2.00 pm (reporting time: 1.45 pm)

Venue: Conference room, 4th Floor, South Goa District Hospital, Margao

Click here for map

Set By: Irish Quiz Organisation

Proctor: Anjali Dar SenGupta 

Participation: Solo, open to all. Please bring your own pens and backing boards.

Format: Written, 240 questions to be answered in 2 hours

Deadline: Midnight on Friday, 25th September 2026 

Registration link: https://forms.gle/qR8T8ZDZ3jjjQLAB7 

Note from the organisers: The format will be similar to the World Quizzing Championships, with 2 papers and a total of 240 questions across 8 categories. The papers will be in English, with questions that are international in scope and NOT Irish-specific.

Only scores at our Irish venue near Dublin will count towards the official results, but we will post all international scores on our website at quizireland.ie

To give an idea of the format and standard of questions, here is a link to the 2025 quiz.

SEQC Margao September Quiz

Date: Sunday, 27th September 2026

Time: 5.00 pm

Venue: SGDH Auditorium, 5th Floor, South Goa District Hospital, Margao

Click here for maps link

QM: Ira Prem & Siddhant Parab

Participation: Open to all

Pop Goes The 80s: 13/Sept/2026: Results

QMs: Angeline Pradhan & Upesh Pradhan 

Results and Scores:

1st place: Team 2: 285 points

Richard Valladares,Melchior Teles, Srishti Maruca, Rajiv D'Silva, Ishan Kakodkar

2nd place: Team 1: 265 points

Judy Branche, Leroy Veloso, Parind Phadte, Paul Gatward, Annie Sen Gupta

3rd place: Team 4: 225 points

Srijit Kumar, Devika Shetty, Anirudh Kakodkar, Kaivalya Karkare, Viola Rodrigues

4th place: Team 3: 155 points

Cosme Aroujo, Kanchan Desai, Mursaleen Salroo, Muntaha Amin, Sameer Volvoicar, Shyam Prasad, Dr Chandrashekhar Rao, Sahil Ramchandani

Pop Goes The 80s: 13/Sept/2026 – content

QMs: Angeline Pradhan & Upesh Pradhan 

Panjim September Monthly (held in Margao): 06/Sept/2026 – content

QM: Annie Sen Gupta

Panjim September Monthly (held in Margao): 06/Sept/2026 – recap and results

QM: Annie Sengupta

Margao Mela 

In an increasingly unpredictable world, we cherish the few things that remain constant. That the first Sunday of the month quiz is conducted at Panaji and the last Sunday of the month at Margao is adhered to more strictly than the Monroe Doctrine. But we live in interesting times and an unhindered run to a VVIP gains priority over any Monroe-Donroe shenanigan.  

The first round was titled ‘We Tour Thailand’ – the ‘We’ standing for Annie and his better half Anjali. The questions and the answers revealed very ancient Indian historical and cultural linkages with this country some 2,000 kms away. It also revealed how good Annie is in absorbing and retaining like a sponge so many facts and trivia on subjects, ranging from religious iconography to the pictorial representation in a menu. 

The QM then led a mela tour, allowing the participant teams to choose from the dozen stalls, displaying either Media, Entertainment, Arts or Literature. Answering correctly the chosen stall ensured a bonus of 5 points. He followed it up with a round titled ‘Wandering Around’ featuring questions from different geographies. Often, teams do not state the answer, if it appears too facile. So when ‘Malacca’ looked like the obvious answer, five teams got it wrong. They assumed that Annie would never ask a question with so easy an answer. Team no 6, with Shaswat Salgaonkar, stated the obvious to get full points.

After wandering around, the prodigal did return to Goa with questions on literary work of Manohar Sardessai and the scholarship of the Kossambi family. It’s a pity that most teams could not link the towering achievements of three generations with the Kossambis.  

Ira Prem shared a delicious cake during the tea and samosa break. After the break Annie got us in an identification parade of presently politically incorrect people. This was followed by another round of Mela. I recollected attending shows conducted by P C Sorcar. His standard act was pouring water from a jar that never seemed to go empty. He would call it water of India. Annie also just keeps on retrieving question after question. Each question thoughtfully crafted and designed. 

It is a good augury for the Margao monthly when enthusiastic participants like the scholarly JK, the elegant Pradhans and AP (a fan of Dejan Drazic 69) take the trouble to cross bridges and travel miles to attend the quiz.

The ultimate proof that it was a great quiz is in the fact that when Annie announced that due to time constraint, he would skip the final round, all participants remained seated for a few minutes. All the more surprising since there was no surprise as to the winners.  Shaswat led Team no 6 to the pole position by a wide margin.

Winding up with an enduring memory of Thailand:

Anjali sought out yak cheese,

Craning her lovely neck left and right,

No yak and no cheese.

By Assis Sequeira

Teams and Results

1st : Team  6: 270 points

Shashwat Salgaocar, Utsav Banerjee,Cosme Araujo, Shiv Nadkarni, Anirudh K, Melchior Teles

2nd: Teams 3 and 4: 185 points

Team 3: Srijit Kumar, Maria Barreto, Magali Vaz, Bonny Furtado, Devika Shetty

Team 4: Upesh Pradhan, Ishan Kakodkar, Rajiv D'Silva, Srishti Maruca, Anjali Sengupta, Ruchira Porob

4th: Team 5: 150 points

Vilas Pavithran,Sanjay Parab,Viola Rodrigues,Assis Sequeira,Ajay Poonia

5th: Team 2: 140 points

Ira Prem, Dr. Ira Almeida, Angeline Pradhan, Kaivalya Karkare, Swati Parab

6th: Team 1: 125 points

Nikhil Sirsat, Terrence D'Costa, J Krishnamurthi, Mervyn Fernandes, Raunak Nevgi

Pop goes the 80s

The Sunday Evening Quiz Club will hold Pop Goes The 80s, a nostalgic music quiz journey through the iconic Western hits of the 80s and 90s. 

Date: Sunday, 13th September 2026
Time: 5.00 pm
Venue: Goa Business School, Taleigao
(Click here for map)
QM: Angeline Pradhan & Upesh Pradhan
Participation: Open to all

SEQC Panjim (shifted to Margao) September Quiz

Due to the Home Minister's visit to Goa today we have been informed that the Goa Business School will not be available for the quiz. Since postponing to a later date is also proving difficult, we have decided to shift today's quiz to Margao. 

Updated details:

Date: Sunday, 6th September 2026

Time: 5.00 pm

Venue: SGDH Auditorium, 5th Floor, South Goa District Hospital, Margao

Click here for map

QM: Aniruddha Sen Gupta 

Participation: Open to all

Margao August Quiz - Content

 QM: Rajiv D'Silva

August Margao Monthly: 30/Aug/2026- recap and results

QM: Rajiv D'Silva

The evidence of the popularity of a quiz is in the enthusiastic recapping ! Today, we have not just one but two hearty recaps, one by Sanjay Parab and the other by Assis Sequeira. For your reading pleasure, below:

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Log kehte hain Rajeev ka quiz mazedaar hota hai… aur log jhooth nahi bolte. 

Sunday evening ko log apne dimaag ki thakaan mitaane ke liye SEQC ke quiz mein jaate hain. Is Sunday bhi hum pahunch gaye — umeed thi dimaag fresh hoga, lekin quiz ne bachi-khuchi energy bhi nikaal li. 

Quiz bahut badhiya tha.

Pehla round August ke baare mein tha — bhot hi badhiya.

Sholay ka question toh made my day. ❤️

Kuch shit ke baare mein bhi do rounds the… 

Maps ka round bhi tha, lekin maine “take right” aur “take left” dono miss kar diye.

Connect round accha tha… sabko aakhirkaar raaste pe laa diya. 😎

Samosa bhi tha, lekin mere taste ka nahi tha — bilkul fika. Quiz ke saamne samosa thoda underwhelming nikla.

Aakhir mein itna hi keh sakta hoon:

Google ki kasam…

Quiz bahut badhiya tha. 🔥 

- Sanjay Parab

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1999 – Charli XCX with Troye Sivan

‘I just wanna go back, back to 1999

Take a ride to my old neighbourhood

I just wanna go back, sing 

“Hit me, baby, one more time”

Rajeev reminds me of an uncorked champagne bottle, bubbling and frothing with enthusiasm and energy. The quintessential quiz master, he researches meticulously, framing the quiz like a multi-coloured quilt, with diversity yet retaining the core theme.

Rajeev chose an octave, apt for the eight month of the year, named after Emperor Agustus (Octavius Gaius). The theme was reflected not only in the content of the questions but also in the number of questions in the written and ‘theme a little theme’ round.

For the first time in months the auditorium at SGDH buzzed. More than thirty-two participants. To add colour to the proceedings, Shaswat, otherwise based in Bangalore, participated. There were also a few first timers and Rajeev in his inimitable style welcomed them and put them at ease.

The quiz started with a written round fixated on events that occurred in the month of August of years gone by. The Quizmaster then seamlessly moved to the next round intriguingly titled as ‘Regular Shit’ with limited pounce. The logic for the title, that I could figure, is that a regular shit should be interrupted a limited number of times only.

Personally, I found the next round titled ‘x y marks the spot’ as the most challenging. Colourful maps listing legends to be unearthed ranging from the spread of Giraffes in Africa to the number of live births to parents of different religious beliefs district wise were projected. One map that foxed all the teams was the distribution of cricket and football as the premier sports in different countries. 

Post tea break, Rajeev started with a nostalgic ‘Back to 1999’ posting the full lyrics and also playing the full video. All the teams scored well in this round, displaying how rooted we remain even after a good twenty six years after 1999.

The next round titled ‘Same shit Different Direction’ had again limited pounce. It covered trivia like ‘Curry’ as a surname in UK and Ireland. The suggestion that the surname had something to do with Indian kitchens threw most off track.

The icing of an enjoyable evening was the last round of ‘theme a little theme’ with high stakes for pouncing and for guessing the theme. Annie, who flew in the morning from Mumbai after a sleepless night, enroute from Thailand was overjoyed on getting the theme right on the first try. 

But with Shaswat around, his team won the first place. Rajeev remained bubbly till the end. The image that I left SGDH was Rajeev as a ‘gurguret’ efficient, cool and certain to quench one’s thirst for Knowledge. Yes, and the lovely lyrics and music of 1999.

-Assis Sequeira

Teams and Scores

1st : Team 4: 335 points

Shashwat Salgaoncar, Bonny,Ajit Nair,Mursaleen Salroo, Muntaha Amin

2nd: Team 3: 305 points

Sanjay Parab, Siddhant Parab, Nikhil Shirsat, Annie Sen Gupta, Anirudha Kakodkar, Shiv Nadkarni

3rd: Team 1: 275 points

R Samyak,Terrence DCosta,Paul Gatward,Raunak Nevgi,Viola Rodrigues, Swati Parab

4th : Team 5: 260 points

Kaivalya Karkare, Devika Shetty,Assis Sequeira,Amoli Birewar,Cosme Araujo,Merwyn

5th: Team 6: 255 points

Srijit Kumar, Adish Talwadkar,Altamash Panjwany,Neha Kamat,Amey Parsekar, Melchior Teles,Parind Phadte

6th : Team 2: 250 points

Ashwini Joglekar, Dr Ira Almeida, Ira Prem, Kanchan Gatward, Angeline Pradhan, Ruchira Porob

SEQC Margao August Quiz

Date: Sunday, 30th August 2026

Time: 5.00 pm

Venue: SGDH Auditorium, 5th Floor, South Goa District Hospital, Margao

Click here for maps link

QM: Rajiv D'Silva

Participation: Open to all

Time & Place Quiz - 16/Aug/2026 - content

QM: Annie Sen Gupta

Time & Place quiz: 16/Aug/2026- recap and results

QM: Annie Sengupta

In the end, the era is irrelevant. Socrates the philosopher and Socrates the footballer may have carried the same ideals, the same ambiguities.They could almost have been the same person, separated by 2,000 years. The ancient cultures believed in superstitions and had blind faith, just like we do. They tried to control land, power, chattel, fates just as we do. Some were wrong and some were wise enough to right their wrongs. They painted over facts and exaggerated their stories, just like we tried to clothe the Harappan dancing girl. They exploited their privileges and they stamped their names into stones and mud and left behind their dead emissaries to speak with us.

We learnt of the remarkable priestess Enheduanna, but who remembers the wandering ascetic who perhaps also recited hymns to her Sumerian gods? Who remembers the descendants of the horsemen and water carriers and cooks who marched alongside the Timurids? Does remembering it all make any difference, since we repeat the same stories across cultures, across timespans and geographies? And so, what is the point of posterity if we refuse to learn? We do not even need asteroids anymore to cause mass extinctions. We still allow the worship of beings that accept innocent child sacrifices. In the end the centuries of enlightenment and revolutions do not automatically produce a wiser civilisation, for we possess the same hubris as our ancestors did.

And yet there is hope , peeking through the murkiness of the past in strange places. One such hope is Piyush Pandey's song of unity in diversity, which Annie played in full as the answer to the last question. If only we could pay heed.

Teams and Scores

1^st : Team 3: 197 points

Prabhav Sidhaye, Mervyn Fernandes, Melchior Teles, Aastha Dua, Daksh Chauhan, Nitish Wagle

2^nd: Teams 1 and 2: 155 points

Team 1: Simran Dhond, Raunak Nevgi, Ruchira Porob. Paul Gatward, Tanmay Naik Pereira, Assis Sequeira

Team 2: Kanchan Gatward, Kaivalya Karkare, R Samyak, Devika Shetty, Viola Rodrigues, Isha

4^th: Team 5: 140 points

Ajit, Anjali Sengupta, Adish Talwadkar, Doc Chandrashekhar Rao, Nishant Kedar, Vilas Pavithran

5^th:Team 6: 138 points

Srijit Kumar, Sunil Sardessai, Saud Sayed, Neha Kamat, Anirudh Kakodkar

6^th: Team 4: 125 points

Utsav Banerjee, Soham Gaunekar, Ajay Poonia, Rochelle Martins, Pankaj Patil,

Namit Kumar

 

SEQC Time & Place

The Sunday Evening Quiz Club will hold Time & Place, a quiz on history with a sprinkling of mythology, culture, geography, and other social sciences, at 5.00 pm on Sunday the 16th of August 2026 at the Goa Business School, Taleigao. 

Date: Sunday, 16th August 2026
Time: 5.00 pm
Venue: Goa Business School, Taleigao
(Link to maps) 
QM: Aniruddha Sen Gupta
Participation: Open to all

Panjim August monthly – 02/Aug/2026 – content

QM: Aman Agarwal

Panjim Monthly – 02/Aug/2026 – results

QM: Aman Agarwal

Results:

1st : Team 3: 1890 points

Vilas Pavithran,Ruchira Porob, Soham Gaunecar, Sunil Sardessai, Abhijeet Virgincar, Anirudh Kakodkar, Nitish Wagle

2nd: Team 6: 1705 points

Srijit Kumar, Adish Talwadkar, Devikas Shetty, Shalini Raju, Siddhant Parab, Doc Chandrashekhar Rao

3rd : Team 2: 1050 points

Viola Rodrigues, Raunak Nevgi, Kanchan Gatward, Mahesh Prabhu, Anjali Sengupta, Atharv Mandrekar, Shujoy Dutta

4th: Team 4: 992.5 points

Ajit Nair, Nihal Bhobe, Mervyn Fernandes, Parind Phadte, Bonny Furtado,Ajay Poonia, Savilio Rodrigues,Gajanan Kendre, Vinayak Singbal

5th: Team 1: 72.5 points

Prabhav Sidhaye, Rajiv D'Silva, Esha Velip, Paul Gatward, Suraj Kamat, Sanjay Parab, Dhanraj Naik

6th: Team 5: 40 points

Annie Sengupta, Kaivalya Karkare, Nikhil Shirsat, Amita Kanekar, Nathan Souza, Valentino Alvares

Margao July monthly – 26/July/2026 – content

QM: Viola Rodrigues

Margao Monthly – 27/July/2026 – recap and results

QM: Viola Rodrigues

 Material Girl

‘Cause we are living in a material world

And I am a material girl

You know that we are living in a material world! 

(Lyrics from Material Girl)

The ‘material world’ conjured by the pop diva Madonna is not the material that Viola works with. A scientist by profession, Viola is observant, analytical and erudite. A true lover of science and scientific thinking.

For Viola, scientific facts and knowledge are not abstract, complex and technical to the point of being beyond the comprehension of a common person. Instead, she brings the scientific temper into the everyday and relatable aspects of life, especially through the food we eat, the beverages we drink and the clothes we wear.

Viola’s quiz spread over four rounds covered not only the flora and fauna, but also trivia on movies, literature, language and everything under the sun. It was above all a great learning experience; who knew that your navel could host some organisms that thrive in the Artic cold and others that survive the underwater vents of hot blasts. It is like Modi and Rahul living in the same small pothole.

There were a few references to the material world as against the materials that make the world by way of exotic food, for instance the macadamia nuts that compelled the pilot to turn back, the reproductive organs of the sea urchin that is a prized dish for the material people like Madonna and others.

The climax was the connect in triads and the grandmother – daughter - granddaughter overall connect. A fitting tribute to the Grandparents Day celebrated across parishes in Goa and other parts of the world.  

Voila! What a way to conclude a great quiz, Viola! May her tribe increase

Written by Assis Sequeira

Results:

1st: Team 2: 285 points

Kaivalya,Ira,Devika, Saud, Assis

2nd: Team 6: 275 points

Anirudh Kakodkar, Shiv Nadkarni, Srijit Kumar,Neha Kamat, Adish Talwadkar

3rd: Team 3: 250 points

Anjali Dar Sengupta, Annie Sengupta,Vinayak Singbal, Swati Parab

4th: Team 1: 240 points

Soham Gaunekar, Simran Dhond,Utsav Banerjee, Ajit Nair, Shujoy Datta

5th: Team 5: 195 points

Amey Parsekar, Vilas Pavithran, Melchior

6th: Team 4: 155 points

Ruchira Porob, Abhijeet, Sahil R, Nitish Wagle, Bhaskar Chakarborty