Gujarat girls is runner up in arithmetic contest

GANDHINAGAR - Payal Merja, a Class 7 girl student from Gujarat, has won the runner up trophy at a mental arithmetic competition in Malaysia, it was announced Monday.

Payal, 11, a student of Bavis Gram Vidyalaya in Vallabh Vidyanagar in central Gujarat, was among 5,000 students in the age group of 4 to 12 from 42 countries who took part in the contest.

“Gujarat is proud that little Payal has won laurels in the Higher-A Category. She solved 161 sums in eight minutes, losing first rank by just one mark,” an official statement said.

The winner was a boy from Saudi Arabia.

Payal can solve around 200 sums in eight minutes without a calculator or any electronic device, the statement said.