India Shines at International Astronomy Olympiad

India delivered an outstanding performance at the 19th International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics (IOAA) 2026, winning four gold medals and one silver medal. The competition was held in Hanoi, Vietnam, from September 25 to October 5, 2026. All five members of the Indian team secured medals. Pranjal Dixit from Hyderabad, Sumant Gupta from Delhi, Akshat Srivastava from Gurugram and Arnav Sehrawat from Faridabad won gold medals, while Harshil Amitkumar Patel from Vadodara secured a silver medal. With four gold medals, India finished joint third in the overall medal tally along with Vietnam. Iran and South Korea topped the standings with five gold medals each. The 2026 IOAA witnessed participation from 307 students representing 64 countries, making it the largest edition of the competition so far. The competition tested students across theoretical astronomy, observation and data analysis, which accounted for 50%, 25% and 25% of the assessment respectively.The achievement is particularly significant for India’s science Olympiad record. This year, for the first time since India began participating in international Olympiads in 1989, every Indian student across the five senior-level Olympiads—Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Biology and Astronomy—won either a gold or silver medal. Out of 24 Indian participants, 16 won gold and eight won silver. The Indian astronomy team was accompanied by Prof. Bhaswati Mookerjea of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) and Prof. Sanved Kolekar of the Indian Institute of Astrophysics. Prof. Aniket Sule of HBCSE-TIFR also attended as the current IOAA president.