Vanya Shivashankar and Gokul Venkatachalam, both Indian-Americans, came to a tie and are named as co-winners of the annual spelling Bee contest. It is the second year in a row that co-champions were named and the fifth time in the history of the bee. Vanya Shivashankar, a 13-year-old is from Olathe, Kan., has joined her sister Kavya as the only siblings to have won the bee. Kavya won the title in 2009.

Indian-Americans account for just less than 1 percent of the US population, but make up more than a fifth of the 285 spellers competing in the 88th edition.

Shivashankar and Venkatachalam, 14, of Chesterfield, Mo., intensively competed for 30 minutes, before both were crowned champs. Back and forth they went, correctly spelling words such as scherenschnitte, pyrrhuloxia, thamakau, caudillismo and a slew of other words which would never be able to decode. The crowd roared as Venkatachalam correctly spelled nunatak to ensure that the victory would be shared.

“This is a dream come true,” said Shivashankar. “I’ve wanted this for such a long time.” She dedicated her win to her late grandmother. “I hope I make her happy with this,” she said. "I'm so, so proud and in awe of my sister," Kavya now a student at Columbia University said.

“I wasn’t nervous at all,” said Venkatachalam. “It was the culmination of all the hard work of the past six years. I’m finally happy to have success.” His one word to describe his win? “Ridiculous.”

The last 10 winners of the Spelling Bee competition and 14 of the past 18, have been Indian-Americans, that began in 1999 with Nupur Lala's victory, which was later featured in the documentary "Spellbound." Vanya and Gokul each will receive around $37,000 in cash and prizes and get the trophy to take home.

"The most surprising words trip spellers up," Paige Kimble, the bee's executive director and the 1981 champion said. "I thought something was going to surprise us here. But it never happened." "I think it's time to consider that the bee may be entering a new era where the level of competition is so intense that we need to entertain this as a possibility every year," she said. "I think the popularity of the event drives up the competitive level and I think that's a good thing."

"Every year, they get better and better," said Anamika Veeramani, who won in 2010. "One thing that kind of surprised me was how often they were asking for roots. They never did that when I was competing."

Racist trolling was casting an ugly pall over social media as the reaction from some of the nearly one million people viewing the finals live posted biased views about the domination of non-Americans on the contest.

"One year I wish an American kid could win," read a Twitter post.

"The kids in the spelling bee should only be AMERICAN," a third tweet said.

Slamming the racist backlash against the winners of Indian-origin, the bee's longtime director Paige Kimble said their domination in the contest could be put down to their "perseverance".

By Premji