Nikhil Kulkarni

(The actual event happened nearly a year back, in Feb 2017. This post though, while written a long time back, was lost in the pile of drafts. Any time is a good time to dust up drafts and publish them, isn’t it? Hence this post!)

I got a chance to participate in That Antha Heli (loosely translated as ‘Answer Quickly’), which is a hugely popular quiz show on DD Chandana. The host Dr. N Someshwara is very well-known, especially for his typical style and for his dedication in running this quiz show. The other interesting thing about this quiz show is that everyone can win something (for the right answers they give) and most importantly, books are given away as prizes.

This was my third time at a TV quiz show after University Challenge (BBC World, 2004) and IMS iQ(Zee Business, 2006).

Actually, I had gone to the Doordarshan studio accompanying my mother. She was taking part in the quiz and we were there for the recording of her episode. While we were waiting for my mother’s episode to get recorded, the producers discovered that one of the participants for the next episode to be shot hadn’t turned up. That episode was to feature ‘young(er?) people’ and they were looking for a replacement. Somehow my mother got the wind of it and checked if I could participate. They said yes, but there was a major hitch. I wasn’t appropriately dressed to appear on TV! The camera angles would have full length shots and I was wearing shorts! Well, sort of. I was in 3/4ths and that wasn’t quite acceptable!

There was still some time before that episode was to be shot and I rushed out to find a clothes store nearby from where I could get a fresh set of clothes. Surprisingly, I couldn’t find any clothes stores from where I could buy a pair of jeans and a shirt. All I could find was a Jockey store. After going around for a while and a with the fear lurking at the back of my mind that I could miss the shoot, I decided just get whatever best I could from the Jockey store. Best, I’m not sure, but I did get something. The largest size available t-shirt which just fit me (and might I add accentuated all my upper body curves) and a pyjama which didn’t quite look like one (thankfully!).

I just reached back around the time my mother’s episode was to be shot and I was glad I was able to catch her episode. She answered the most number of questions correctly and was the top scorer in her episode 🙂

Here’s how the studio setup looks like:

And how it looks like when the recording is happening:

It was a very interesting experience to be in front of the camera (again!). Thankfully, got the right answers on the buzzer this time around. Had made a mess of it in University Challenge 🙂

I ended up being the top scorer in my espisode as well! Here’s my mother and I with our prizes.

And with the legendary Dr. N Someswara:

What a day it turned out to be! Some of the most interesting things happen when you expect them to happen the least.

The episode was finally telecast in April and it was quite funny to see oneself on TV and felt quite good reliving the memories of the day when the episode was shot!

Since it’s about quizzing, here’s some trivia about Dr. Someswara himself. His strict and to-the-point nature of conducting the quiz generates a lot of memes! You’ll need to know Kannada to understand them though. You’ll find many of them by TrollHaiklu, Troll Bengaluru etc.

Also, one of his often repeated lines is “illi nakaratmaka tantra galige avakashavilla” which means “no negative tactics allowed here”. There’s even a question on Quora on this! Even in a regular conversation among people, this line is often used to tell the other person, in jest, to play fair! Remember, “illi nakaratmaka tantra galige avakashavilla”!