Winners of the Mindblaster quiz. Picture by Bhola Prasad

Jamshedpur, Dec. 7: Young minds were put to test at Michael John Auditorium here today.

Did you know that there was snow in the Sahara desert a long time ago? Were you aware of the fact that Mt Everest is the highest dumping place in the world? Have you ever heard that after dog, goat was the second animal to be tamed by man?

These are only a handful of the numerous interesting facts, which came to the fore at the fourth annual environment quiz, Mindblaster, organised by the Society for Promotion of Professional Excellence.

Testing questions on planet Earth and its environment made the participants as well as members of the audience rack their brains for answers.

While students from 12 schools took part in the quiz, defending champions Little Flower emerged on top. The team, represented by Biten Nath and Sailesh Mahapatra, scored 57.5 points to win the event.

The winning team received a cash prize of Rs 6,000. The team from Jamshedpur Public School comprising Suresh Ramamurthy and Sneha scored 48.5 points to finish second and receive a cash prize of Rs 5,000. The Sacred Heart Convent team of Rusha Ghosh and Namrata Sinha amassed 34 points to clinch the third spot. The team received a cash prize of Rs 4,000.

The three other teams to reach the final were Church School, Beldih, Loyola School and Hill Top School. The quiz was conducted by management consultant and quizmaster Dicky Modi.

Though Jamshedpur Public School led till the end of the third round, the Little Flower duo put up a brilliant show in the picture and speed rounds to win the quiz.

Lady Luck did not smile on Loyola School, which was way behind the leaders in the end.

Sumathi Muthuraman, the chief guest of the event, lauded the efforts of the participants and gave away the prizes.