India Bags 3 Gold, 2 Silver Medals In 15th IOAA Olympiad
The 15th International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics (IOAA) 2022 was held in Georgia, from August 14 to 21, 2022. The IOAA aims to promote the growing interest of students in Astronomy and related STEM subjects. The Indian contingent bagged three gold medals and two silver medals. Raghav Goyal of Chandigarh won a special prize for the best solution to the most challenging theoretical question.
Raghav Goyal, Md Sahil Akhtar of Kolkata and Mehul Borad of Hyderabad bagged one gold medal each. While Malay Kedia of Ghaziabad and Atharva Nilesh Mahajan of Indore has clinched one silver medal each. There were 209 students from 37 main and 6 guest teams who participated in this year's IOAA. In addition, 24 students from 6 countries participated in the online mode. In the 15th IOAA event, India finished in third position (3 golds, 2 silver) along with Singapore, behind Iran's official team (5 golds) and guest team (4 golds, 1 silver).
| Name Of The Contestant | Medal Secured |
Raghav Goyal | Gold |
Md Sahil Akhtar | Gold |
Mehul Borad | Gold |
Malay Kedia | Silver |
Atharva Nilesh Mahajan | Silver |
The team was accompanied by two leaders including Professor Sarita Vig (Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology, Thiruvananthapuram) and Professor Ajit Mohan Srivastava (Institute of Physics, Bhubaneswar). Two Scientific observers Dr Shriharsh Tendulkar (Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai) and Mr Tejas Shah (Fr Agnel Multipurpose School & Jr College, Navi Mumbai) were also a part of the team. Dr Tendulkar was himself a gold medallist at the International Astronomy Olympiad in 2002 and 2003 (overall topper in the latter).
"Professor Aniket Sule faculty at Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education (HBCSE) has been elected President of the international body of IOAA for a five year term during this year's event. For the last five years, Professor Sule has served as the General Secretary of IOAA," HBCSE said in a release.