The team members of Loreto Convent Darjeeling who emerged winners in the debate. (Kundan Yolmo)

Siliguri, Sept.8: It was a war of words today at the “Confluence Debate 2011” where students from 11 schools slugged it out to argue for a topic and then speak against their own points.

The debate marked the end of the three-day inter-school event, christened Confluence. The programme was hosted by St Michael’s School in association with The Telegraph at Savin Kingdom near Siliguri.

The new element at the debate this year was the “turncoat” round or elimination round, in which speakers started by speaking in favour of a topic and then changed their views.

“Each team has two members and one of them would speak both for and against a particular topic. The contestant will be given a minute to speak for the motion and another minute to oppose it. Four best teams will be selected from the 11 to participate in the finals,” said Parnab Mukherjee, the moderator and judge of the debate.

The participants chose from two topics: “syllabus kills creativity”, and “Indian sports is still a metaphor for underachievement”.

“India has excelled in sports like polo, hockey, chess, shooting and cricket and we have sportsmen like Abhinav Bindra and Mahendra Singh Dhoni who made us proud. This year, we have also won the ICC Cricket World Cup and can easily boast that what cricket is to India, football is to Brazil. But does Brazil play cricket with the same zeal that India plays football? The answer is no. So it is wrong to say that India is an underdog in sports world,” said Ashwin Chettri of Gyanodoy Niketan, Darjeeling while arguing against the motion.

But Ashwin immediately switched sides at the tinkle of the bell. “Sport in India is ridden with corruption and there is lack of proper facilities for budding sportsmen. It is merely a handful few from the elite society who make it big and those without resources go unrecognised. Take for example, shooting in India. There are very less facilities for the sports in our country. But Abhinav Bindra is an ace shooter today because he had the financial backup of his rich parents,” he argued.

The children were judged on the basis of speech layout, clarity, originality, on the spot humour and audience response.

Loreto Convent Darjeeling, St Augustine’s School Kalimpong, Jermel’s Academy Siliguri and Gyanoday Niketan Darjeeling made it to the finals for which the topic was “Indian middle-class is so self-absorbed that they hardly understand the poor.”

Both members of the teams participated in the final rounds, conducted in classical format.

As the event concluded, Parnab chose Loreto Convent Darjeeling as the best, followed by St Augustine’s School Kalimpong. Gyanoday Niketan Darjeeling and Jermel’s Academy Siliguri were adjudged third and fourth respectively.

Ashwin and Debsmita were adjudged the best speakers.

“We hosted the fourth edition of Confluence this year and its huge success is attributed to the participation of all the schools. We plan to invite schools from Guwahati and Calcutta next year,” said Robin Chakraborty, the vice-principal of St Michael’s School.

After the debate, prizes were awarded to the winners.