Seven-year-old Kaviyashree Murugan has won the third prize in the poem recital category of a global talent competition.

The Standard 1 pupil of SJKT Sungai Renggam in Shah Alam, Selangor, secured the win with a beautiful recitation of her poem titled "Amma", dedicated to mothers.

Kaviyashree recited the poem penned by her father Murugan, and defeated other contestants much older than her, in the under-12 category to place third in the International Budding Star 2021 competition, organised by India-based education group Vibrant Education.

According to her mother Sri Vidya, Kaviyashree has always loved the Tamil language and started taking tuition for it when she was just five.

Besides, the child also has remarkable memory power, as she has previously won Thirukkural recitation and story telling competitions.

It took about three days for her to memorize this particular poem, Sri Vidya told Astro Ulagam.

"When her school told us about the competition, we decided to get her to join it for the exposure.

"We did not expect her to win, to be honest," said Sri Vidya, adding that the win came as more of a surprise for her and her husband, while Kaviyashree was pretty "chilled" about it.

"To her, the win seems justified, given the effort she put in."

Participants of the competition, which was held online due to the COVID-19 pandemic, were aged below 12, between 13 and 17, and above 18, from Malaysia, Singapore, India, Oman and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

The categories of participation, meanwhile, were story telling, poem recitation, public speaking, and drawing, while the languages used were Tamil, English, Urdu, Telugu, and Sanskrit.

Congratulations on your win little one!

Here's wishing you all the very best for you to reach greater heights in the future!


Photo source: Sri Vidya