- Thursday, April 24, 2025
Indian-Americans have been dominating the National Spelling Bee which started in 1925.
By: Shubham Ghosh
Dev Shah, an Indian-origin boy, has won the prestigious Scripps National Spelling Bee contest on Thursday (1) night in Maryland, bagging a cash prize of $50,000 by correctly spelling ‘psammophile’, an 11-letter word which means an organism that likes to live in sandy soil.
The 14-year-old boy, who previously took part in the competition in 2019 and 2021, is also reportedly the 22nd champion of the contest with a South Asian heritage in the last almost decade and half.
UnBEElievable! #Speller36 Dev Shah representing the SNSB Region One Bee in Largo, Florida is the Champion of the 95th Scripps National Spelling Bee. His winning word? Psammophile. ? #spellingbee pic.twitter.com/ebM8jUU6xZ
— Scripps National Spelling Bee (@ScrippsBee) June 2, 2023
He called his feat surreal and said his legs were still shaking.
“Psammo meaning sand, Greek? Phile, meaning love, Greek?” Dev asked as he identified the word’s roots, but asked about the details to be sure, according to the New York Times.
The champion boy’s parents were visibly emotional as they took the stage.
He was one of the 11 finalists from among 11 million contestants from across the globe. While the preliminary rounds started on Tuesday (30), the quarterfinals and semifinals were held a day later.
Indian-Americans have been dominating the National Spelling Bee which started in 1925. The contest, which is open to students till the eighth grade, was cancelled in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic but resumed the next year with some changes.
Last year, Harini Logan, an eighth-grader from Texas, won it, defeating Vikram Raju, another Indian-American.
