Coding it right

‘Try till you succeed’ was the mantra for Yash Sadhwan and Sagar Kaniche from IIT Hyderabad, who bagged  the 1st prize of $10,000, at the CodeVita contest held in Chennai recently.

CodeVita is a global contest by Tata Consultancy Services, (TCS) for engineering and science students to sharpen their programming skills.

“The contest gave us the opportunity to learn and interact with peers in the world of technology through a competitive environment. The first round saw more than 46,000 teams from around the world to de-bug or code a programme within a stipulated time,” says Sagar, the 21-year-old from Pune.

Yet another duo, Kailash Gandebathula and Chaitanya Alaparthi from IIIT Hyderabad also walked away with the third prize of $3,000. “We had to complete 10 coding problems and algorithms in a highly intense environment within six hours. The competition tested our technical knowledge, speed, alertness and creativity,” says Kailash, 4th year student of CSE, IIIT Hyderabad.

Apart from their love for coding, the bond which ties both the teams is their love for taking up challenges with élan, coupled with great chemistry between the team mates.

While Yash and Sagar are travel buddies, Kailash and Chaitanya are partners in crime. “Yash and I have travelled a lot together. Last year, we went to Goa and the North Eastern states. Yash is already off to Manali,” shares Sagar.

Both the teams were inspired by their seniors’ achievements in various competitions. “Our seniors got many recognitions, which inspired us to be part of such challenges,” says Chaitanya.

It was a long journey to the pinnacle. “Last year, we had participated in this competition, but our rankings weren’t good. So, we planned to solve each code together rather than individually, taking up a single problem. It worked in our favour,” says Sagar. Meanwhile, the IIIT Hyderabad team had a different game plan — Kailash went in for running the code, while Chaitanya wrote them.

The IIT Hyderabad team says they will splurge the prize money on gadgets — a high-end laptop for Chaitanya and an iPhone for Kailash.