By Arun Kumar
IANS
Washington : Evan M. O'Dorney, 13, a California schoolboy won the Scripps National Spelling Bee contest after early elimination of this year's favourite, Samir Patel, an Indian American contesting for the fifth time in a row.
Crowned champion on prime-time national television in the 80th edition of the contest, O'Dorney will receive $35,000 cash, a $5,000 scholarship, a $2,500 savings bond and a complete set of reference works.
While O'Dorney made it to the top in the 13th round correctly spelling "serrefine", Patel, one of the 29 spellers of Indian origin among a record 286 contestants, tripped on 'clevis', a type of fastener. He had finished third, 27th, second and 14 in the previous editions.
But three other Indian American kids advanced to the final round of the contest that attracted 10 million contestants at the state level this year.
Prateek Kohli, 13, New York fell in the ninth round when he failed to get "Oberek" right after correctly spelling Martian, convivial, diocesan, onychomycosis and saimin.
Son of Monica Kohli, a software engineer, and Vimal Kohli, a senior operations supervisor, Prateek believes himself to be the best speller in his family, although his mother claims to have been the best in her school.
Kavya Shivashankar, 11, from Kansas was eliminated in the seventh round going wrong on "Cilice" after correctly spelling enumerated, tachymeter, Gruyère, porphyry, and auslaut in the earlier rounds.
Nithya P. Vijayakumar, 13, from Michigan also tripped in the seventh round as he failed to get "Pelorus" correct after making it to the final with therapeutic, kinetic, zeugma, grego and coquillage.
Earlier, Sameer Mishra, Samir Gupta and Abhinav Venkat fell in the sixth round while Maithreyi Gopalakrishnan was eliminated in the fifth round with Samir Patel.
It was the last chance for Patel who had become a familiar face on the contest finishing third four years ago. But in 2004, he stumbled on the word "corposant" and tied for 27th. He came close in 2005 but was flummoxed by "Roscian" and placed second. Last year, he failed to spell "eremacausis", forcing him to settle for a tie for 14th.
Kunal Sah, the 13-year-old Indian American boy who hoped a strong showing in the Scripps National Spelling Bee contest might somehow reunite him with his deported parents, was eliminated in the preliminary rounds itself.
Children of Indian origin have figured prominently in the contest since 1985 when Balu Natarajan, a 13-year-old son of Indian American parents, won by correctly spelling the word "milieu".