Indian American teen wins 2010 US Spelling Bee contest

Washington, June 5 (ANI): Indian American teen Anamika Veeramani has been crowned champion of the 2010 Scripps National Spelling Bee here. She won the contest on Friday night.

A 14-year-old from North Royalton, Ohio, Veeramani successfully spelled "juvia" and "stromuhr" to become the bee's 83rd champion and defeat Shantanu Srivatsa of West Fargo, N.D. in the final round.

According to a kypost.com report, Veeramani's win will earn her a 30,000 dollars in cash and an engraved trophy from the event's sponsor, The E.W. Scripps Co..

She will also get 2,500 dollars U.S. savings bond and a complete reference library from Merriam-Webster, a 5,000-dollar scholarship from the Sigma Phi Epsilon Educational Foundation and a package from Encyclopedia Britannica totaling 3,499 dollars.

Veeramani, who finished fifth in last year's bee, also survived a marathon 4-1/2-hour semi-final round earlier Friday that contained a little bit of controversy.

It started when another early favorite, Neetu Chandak, 14, of Seneca Falls, Ny. who finished eighth last year, appeared to stumble over "paravane," an underwater glider device, in the fifth round. ut the judges reversed the decision eliminating her, blaming the "ambiguous nature of the answers" when she asked about a root word. But given a second chance in the sixth round, she misspelled "apogalacteum," the point at which a celestial body is furthest away from the Milky Way.

The Bee, sponsored by the E.W. Scripps Co., drew 273 contestants, some from as far away as China and New Zealand. They included 8-year-old, Vanya Shivashankar of Olathe, Kan., the youngest sister of last year's champion, Kavya Shivashankar.

The Scripps National Spelling Bee has been has held annually since 1925 save for the war years of 1943-45. (ANI)