Speedcuber Shivam Bansal, 24, is the Asian champion in 5×5 blindfolded and multi-blindfolded. | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Last month, on the 50th anniversary of the Rubik’s Cube, Mitsubishi Electric’s TOKUFASTbot set a new Guinness World Record by solving the 3×3 puzzle in just 0.305 seconds – this is the time it takes for a human eye to blink. The human record for solving a 3×3 cube is 3.13 seconds (Max Park of USA, 2023). According to the World Cube Association (WCA), there are 2,21,713 cubers in the world and 17,610 in India, the fastest of them being Aryan Chhabra who solves it in an average of 6.53 seconds.
Since its invention five decades ago, cube lovers have found new ways to take the sport to the next level. While India’s representation on the global cubing stage is far less than desired, many parts of the country have enough potential to gain international fame.
In 2011, encouraged by the enthusiasm of its students passionate about solving the puzzle, IIT Bombay (IIT-B) formed a Rubik’s Cube Club. The very next year, the institute broke the world record for the most people solving the cube simultaneously, with 937 cubers solving the puzzle in less than 30 minutes. Since then, interest in the largely male-dominated sport has grown manifold. In fact, a Rubik’s Cube workshop is held as an icebreaker for new students in July after dinner. This year, the club is trying to organise a WCA tournament, says Yash Kulkarni, a third-year student of Metallurgical Engineering and Materials Science and the club’s manager.
Students at the Rubik’s Cube Club at IIT-Bombay. | Photo courtesy: Emmanuel Yogini
Cuber Abhijeet Ghodgaonkar, who was a Research Fellow at IIT-B from 2021 to 2023 and is currently a Scientific Officer at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, is the WCA trainee representative from India West region and a member of the Advisory Council since 2019. He has participated and organised several cubing competitions in India, and has taken part in 89 WCA competitions in four different countries. Abhijeet Ghodgaonkar, 28, is the current Asian champion in 4×4 blindfolded and the national record holder in 4×4 blindfolded and 5×5 blindfolded. “We want to encourage more people to take up the cube,” he says. “All cubers who participate or organise events do it out of personal interest
Cuber Abhijeet Ghodgaonkar
broad appeal
Shivam Bansal, a 24-year-old software professional from Agra, has been cubing since 2010. A former world record holder in 3×3 Multi-Blindfolded (MBLD), he is currently ranked fourth in this category, and is the Asian champion in 5×5 Blindfolded and MBLD. He is the No. 1 Indian in the Kinch Rank, the overall ranking in Rubik’s Cube. He also holds two Guinness World Records in MBLD 48/48 and the record for most cubes solved in an hour by a team. “Inspiration runs in the family as my sister Saumya is also a cuber,” says Bansal. “She is the only Indian female cuber to have participated in two World Championships. She is also a former female national record holder in Pyraminx, Skub.”
shivam bansal
Bansal, who has been a cuber since the age of 10, has his eyes set on the upcoming Rubik’s WCA Asian Championship 2024, to be held in Malaysia in November, and the WCA World Championship 2025 in Washington.
Prospects for women
Prisha Agarwal, 12, never expected that a hobby she took up during the Covid-19 lockdown would open doors to fame and national records. In February 2023, she set a new national record (female category) by becoming the fastest child to solve a 5×5 cube at the Skube Indian National Championship in the 5×5 and 6×6 cube categories. In December that year, Agarwal participated in the Indian National Cubing Championship held at the North-Eastern Hill University campus in Shillong, where she set additional records in the 5×5, 6×6 and Skube events. “It all started with the pandemic when I used to watch YouTube tutorials to try and solve the Rubik’s Cube. Seeing me engrossed in it, my mother enrolled me in an online class,” says Agarwal, a seventh grade student from New Delhi.
No sport today is gender-centric. But, in cubing, women still have a long way to go as their participation in WCA events is barely 10%, says Agrawal. “I also think there is a feeling among people that cubing is only for boys. If we encourage girls too, we will see more participation from them at all levels.”
Behind a competition
Soham Adarkar, co-founder of Cubenamas, an online store for cubing supplies, has been participating and organising Rubik’s Cube events since 2015. So far, he has participated in 42 competitions and organised and supported over 30 official competitions and many unofficial cubing events in Maharashtra, Kerala, New Delhi, Punjab, Goa, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu. He says that to organise a Rubik’s Cube competition, one just needs a good understanding of the game, a venue and a good team. “Once the pre-requisites are met, you send a request to the WCA, which regulates all official speed cubing competitions across the world,” he says.
For a country that has produced dozens of chess grandmasters, it is surprising that the Rubik’s Cube is still considered a toy, says Adarkar. “Though the competitions are self-funded and the organisers do not make any money from the competition as the WCA is a recognised non-profit, we do it for the community.”
purnima.sah@thehindu.co.in
