Christmas is going to be different for crossword solvers of the country.

The finals of Indian Crossword League (IXL 2015) will be held in Bangalore on December 25.

The cryptic crossword competition involves online and offline formats. Participants are given grids every Sunday, which they are supposed to solve within a week in the online format.

Ten such online rounds are organised, from which the top 20 scorers are invited to play the finals that are played offline.

This year the competition also made a North American debut in Toronto (Canada) on October 25. A New York round has also been planned for December 13.

The winner of the Toronto Round, IIT alumnus Venkatraman Krishnan, has already qualified for the final.

The event is organised by Patna-based civil society initiative Extra C and was held for the first time in 2013, which also happened to be the centenary year for crosswords.

The first crossword, which was published in a US daily, was created by Arthur Wynne and was carried by The New York World for its Christmas-eve edition.

The third edition of the IXL was launched in Calcutta on September 27.

Going by the final scores, Indian Space Research Organisation scientist Mohsin Ahmed emerged the top scorer in the online rounds. It is a hat- trick as he had topped the charts after online rounds in the first two editions of the game as well.

"One feels great for the achievement but this time I would like to win the finals as well," Mohsin, who failed to win the championship in the first two attempts, told The Telegraph over the phone from Bangalore.

Though the space scientist is hoping to win the event this time, he knows that the competition is going to be tough.

"All those who qualify for the finals have the merit to lift the cup and the luck factor comes into play too once one competes at this level," he said.

Secunderabad-based software professional Ramesh Jagannathan, who secured the ninth position after 10 online rounds, heaped encomiums on the event organisers of the event. "They are doing a great job by organising such an event as the game has still not become very popular in the country," he said.

Jagannathan had qualified for the finals last year too, but could not participate because of personal issues. "I hope to take part in this year's finals," he said.

He said compared to the previous year, the standard of clues had gone up this time, and it was a good sign from the competitive point of view.

Bihar cadre IAS officer Vivek Kumar Singh, the brain behind organising the event and who has witten a book on cryptic crosswords, told The Telegraph that some wildcard entries would be allowed in the finals too, so that all the regions get representation in the event.

Terming this year's event a different kind of experience, IXL director (legal and public relations) Kushagra Singh said the entry of many new faces in the competition and some of them making it to the finals showed that the crosswords were becoming popular with every passing year.

Shashwat Sinai Salgaocar, an IIT-Madras student who was not part of the first two editions of the game, has qualified for the finals. Shashwat has secured the seventh position after 10 online rounds in his maiden attempt.