Indian Students Shine At International Linguistics Olympiad 2026 With Gold, Three Bronze Medals In Romania

India has secured a gold medal, three bronze medals and an Honourable Mention at the International Linguistics Olympiad (IOL) 2026 held in Romania, marking another strong performance by the country’s students at the global competition.

As per the IIIT Hyderabad website, gold medallist Shrilakshmi Venkatraman emerged as India’s top performer. Aarav Anil Rao, Nishanth Shankar Lakshmanan and Advay Misra won bronze medals, while Soham Amit Pednekar received an Honourable Mention. The Indian contingent has consistently won honours in categories including Best Solution, Best Team and Best Student at the IOL since 2009.

Speaking about her experience at the Olympiad, gold medallist Shrilakshmi Venkatraman said, "I loved the semantic problem about colour terms in Yelî Dnyé from the individual problem set. The phenomenon was very unique and interesting to unravel."

The Indian team’s participation and preparation are supported through the Panini Linguistics Olympiad (PLO), with IIIT Hyderabad taking over its mentoring in 2015 through its Language Technologies Research Centre (LTRC). The programme trains students to solve challenging language-based puzzles that test logical reasoning, pattern recognition and computational thinking. Unlike mathematics or physics Olympiads, IOL problems do not require prior knowledge of linguistics.

For PLO 2026, registrations began in November 2025, followed by the Open National Qualifying Contest in February 2026. Of 525 entries, 338 students appeared for the first round. The top performers progressed to an invitational camp and round two. Thirty-four qualifying entries then attended a 10-day residential camp at the IIIT Hyderabad campus from May 31 to June 10, featuring lectures, mentoring, problem-solving sessions, mock Olympiads and evaluations.

The top two teams subsequently underwent an intensive boot camp before travelling to Romania for IOL 2026. The Indian delegates were led by IIIT-H faculty-in-charge Prof. Parameswari Krishnamurthy and Faraz Siddiqui.

IIIT Hyderabad also noted that the Olympiad is helping create a pipeline of students interested in artificial intelligence, natural language processing (NLP), cognitive science and language technology. According to the institute, past PLO participants have gone on to pursue higher studies in AI and NLP, including at MIT and other leading institutes.