WOW!! The word entrepreneurship is so hot right now, in India, that the word has grabbed the use of the letter 'e'. If this was five years ago, or even two years anyone would have mistaken 'E-Week' for Electronic Week. That is hot. The National Entrepreneurship Network is holding a week long event across the country, across 200 odd educational institutes. Ok, that might be a little wrong. Let me rephrase that to say that they have have 'enabled' these many many institutes to conduct it themselves.

Being a journalist on leave, I miss doing the rounds and writing about it. My first stop was the International School of Business and Media (ISBM) in Bangalore. The E-cell team at the ISBM operated with the efficiency of a professional PR company by recieving, escorting and feeding a hungry journalist. The E-vent of the day was a quiz contest that had 22 sharply dressed teams (44 students) gunning for a shiny medal.

The rules were read out, the powerpoint was up and the NEN logo stood there next to ISBMs. The hall was nearly full with contestants and the back rows had a handful of observers. On entering the hall wearing a floral patterned holiday shirt I stuck out like a sore toe from a torn shoe. After all, all these guys and gals were in nicely pressed suits.

To make things worse I was invited to sit on stage. I refuse, naturally. We journalists prefer to be observers rather than the observed. Instead I settle for giving a little introduction on stage and proceed to take my place at the back of the hall. The first question zapped me and the audience. "Who coined the term 'Sensex'?" A couple of heads turn to see if the representative from the pink papers had that knowing look. He doesn't. I have no idea who came up with this other popular word.

It was the elimination round and as the questions rolled on, I began to realise that there wasn't much 'E' to the quiz. It was a rather general quiz round. "It would probably get more focussed."- I thought to my self. "What is the full-form of ICICI?" Hands shoot up all over the hall. These kids probably prepared well for their campus placement interviews. Then came the first E-question. "Who are the co-founders of….. hold your breath.. Google?".

Hmmmm. Doing the E-rounds in Mumbai, I've gotten used to the idea of companies wanting to come up with the next disruptive idea, be the next Google. I hear it, as well as, feel this ambition all the time. Couple of college kids, solving a problem that the whole world , or a whole industry, adopts as their own solution. Maybe one of these well-groomed students will come up with one of their own. There were plenty of sharp minds and bright eyes in that hall, for that sort of competition to happen.

Besides that there were a lot of fun questions like "Which is the most commonly used English word?" Hands and voices start bobbing around the hall. The usual suspects like "is", "the", "and", "at" show up. They all lose to "ok". "Ok"! That's interesting and funny too. "Who did that survey?"- said a student next to me. I laughed. S/he sounded like a journalist.

Few more E-questions. Many questions whose answers I ought to have known, but shamelessly don't. Why do I need to memorise anymore? Considering I have all the brilliant search technologies on my phone. These are excuses I make to myself. Most of my professional memory is in my notepads anyway. The rest in journal. No need for memory. Ha ha.

"Who is the author of 'High Performance Entrepreneur"?- "Ah! Good one. It was good to see that people were reading the relevant books. "Which foundation launched the NEN?" The team being questioned were stumped. The question passes on. An E-cell coordinator gobbles up that point. Thank goodness! And so the 22 teams go through the round. That was only the first round.

The contest goes through a "Name the brand atttached to this tagline" round, and then an "Identify the Logo" round. More marketing than entrepreneurship. Not too interesting. I then decide to go out and get a bite around the two hour mark. A bread omelette and samosa later I come back and hear that the "Identify the face round" had just happened which actually included some entrepreneurs in the mix with Steve Waugh and Indira Nooyi. The final round had questions with answers like Amitabh Bachchan and Abdul Kalam. It was a good general quiz. But surely more effort could have been put in to be more entrepreneur-focussed.

A faculty member had informed me of this E-Quiz the previous day. On the way out, she asked me for critical feedback, and I promised to write about it. So here it is. I feel that though two people had put the whole quiz together at a very good standard, it could have been a lot better. This could have happened if more people had contributed to the pool of questions. Not a whole list, but maybe 3 questions from each of the five (or six) organisers that conducted the event. Or maybe, each organiser could have invented a separate round. This would have brought a range of creativity to the quiz and a higher quality of questions. Two people had put in fantastic efforts and the result was commendable. More cooks would have made a more interesting broth.