Team India emerge as World Champions at the World Schools Debating Championships (2019) Team India emerge as World Champions at the World Schools Debating
Championships 2019
Team India, consisting of five debaters trained and selected by the
Indian Schools Debating Society (ISDS) are the World Champions of the
prestigious World Schools Debating Championships (WSDC) 2019. This is
the first time India has won WSDC, and the first time in 31 years of
WSDC debating that a South Asian country has won World Schools. India
is also the second ever developing country in the world to have won
this title. Historically, more developed, English as a first language
nations have dominated World Schools (with Australia winning the
championship the most number of times, followed by England). Tejas
Subramaniam has also been awarded the title of Best Speaker in the
world. This makes India the first country in 7 years to have won the
best speaker award in consecutive years. In addition to this, Bhavya
Shah was adjudged 6th best speaker in the world – this is the first
ever time a visually impaired speaker has spoken in a WSDC final, and
made it to the top 10 speakers in the world at WSDC. Manya Gupta was
adjudged 14th best speaker in the world.
WSDC is the World Cup of high school debating, and the championship is
hosted by the national debate societies of different nations every
year. This year, Thailand hosted the tournament between 24 July and
1st August 2019 in Bangkok. The tournament saw over 600 participants
from 64 nations.
India’s performance this year is both India’s best by far, and one of
the best performances any country has ever put up at a WSDC. India
finished as the best nation at the tournament overall, defeating
Canada in the final 9-0, meaning all 9 judges on the panel,
unanimously voted in favour of India, a feat that has not been
achieved by any country in the last decade. Additionally, India
remained undefeated throughout the tournament, not losing a single
preliminary round (of the 8 rounds), and winning almost every debate
unanimously (of the total possible 48 judge ballots a team can receive
across rounds, India had 47 – the highest any country has ever had in
the last decade). This also beat our existing records from 2018, where
India narrowly lost the Grand Final to China on a 5-4 decision.
This performance is particularly impressive, as along the way to this
victory, India faced and defeated some of the best teams in the World,
as WSDC is “power-paired” (where teams of equal strength based on
their wins go up against each other). In the preliminary rounds, India
faced and beat teams including England, Canada, Denmark, South Africa,
and Ireland. In the knock-out rounds, India faced and defeated the
formidable Bangladesh and Pakistan teams in the octo-final and the
quarter-final respectively. In the semi-final, India went up against
the defending champions, China, who also defeated India in the final
last year. In the final, India faced Canada.
These results are a first in India’s history of attending WSDC in the
last decade, making them fitting result for a ten-year anniversary.
The five-member team representing Team India comprising of Tejas
Subramaniam (Chennai), Manya Gupta (Jaipur), Bhavya Shah (Mumbai),
Prithvi Arun (Chennai), and Saranya Ravindran (Chennai) was selected
from a nation-wide selection process conducted by ISDS spanning over 6
months, 12 cities, and 1000 students. The team was armed with 6 months
of intensive training from Sayeqa Islam, Dhruva Bhat, Dhananjay Ashok,
and Kenza Wilks – some of the best debaters and coaches around the
world. This coaching team was supported by all the Team India ISDS
alumni, and other incredible debaters from around the world.
India’s progression at WSDC 2019
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