The international Astronomy Olympiad was held at the special astrophysical observatory of the Russian academy of sciences from October 20 to 26.

Ranchu Mathew and Varun Bhalerao, the two city lads, returned with a gold medal and bronze medal respectively in the under-16 category while two Lucknow lads Diwakar Shukla and Jayesh Raj returned with bronze medals in the under-18 category.

Participation of all these four youngsters was sponsored by the Astronomical Society of India (ASI) with financial support from the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). A fifth student, Vaibhav Puri from Lucknow, participated in the Olympiad through private financial support.

Before their departurefor Russia, the lads were coached for a week at the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) and the National Centre of Radio Astrophysics (NCRA) here.

Enthused by the success of the four students, the ASI, which is an astronomical society of 500 members committed to the popularisation of astronomy, has decided to organise an Astronomy Olympiad at the national level from next year onwards. The ASI proposes to hold preliminary rounds of the national olympiad throughout the country in association with the Indian physics teachers association, ASI president Dr V K Kapahi told reporters here today while announcing the success of the students.

The students who do well in the national olympiad would be shortlisted for selecting them for the international astronomy olympiads in the future, Dr Kapahi stated. Incidentally, next year the international olympiad will be held at Crimean astrophysical observatory in October.

This year's international olympiad had, however, evoked a lukewarmresponse with only five countries participating as against the 17 nations that had participated in the previous olympiad.

Ranchu and Varun, who told reporters about their experience at the Olympiad, said they had to face three types of tests -- theoretical, experimental and practical. Interpreting data gathered by astronomers and identifying binary stars were just a few of the `simpler'' tasks that the lads had to perform before they could return home with the coveted medals.