Ever since I started listening to Hindi movie songs, her voice has been an endless source of inspiration — not just for its unmatched versatility, but for the sheer magic it weaves as she effortlessly glides and swings into the notes. While the world celebrated her peppy numbers, enduring ghazals, playful duets, I re-discovered her music in the Covid years while turning her songs into puzzles. GoSH! How time flies.
Today, as the music world mourns, I sit with gratitude. Thank you for filling my blog with rebuses, my heart with delight, and my life with melodies that never fade. Your songs didn’t just entertain; they gave us a lifelong creative companion.
Here’s my humble tribute to the hours spent listening to Ashaji’s songs over the years. ye dil, abhi nahi bhara..
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Limit of 1 clue per setter. Please Annotate your clues clearly.
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Contest closes at 8:00 AM, April 17, 2026 after which VOTING will be open.
All participants who set clues are expected to vote as well. So please check when the Voting opens and/or bookmark the links
Voting will close at 7:00 AM, April 19, 2026 after which Results will be announced.
This week’s clue contest on 1ACCWC received good participation with 30 entries, and 33 voters having their say well ahead of the deadline.
Many setters played on variations of the simple anagram of COP+LIE = POLICE. Other popular entries referenced current affairs and geopolitics surrounding OIL, an anagram of which is contained in POLICE.
While I’m pleased for those who have done well in this edition of 1ACCWC, I must also express some criticism towards the voters. I think this particular issue even keeps a few very good setters from participating in 1ACCWC regularly.
A cryptic crossword clue has two readings – the surface reading and the cryptic reading, the latter of which is like a set of instructions for the solver to arrive at the solution. In a good clue, BOTH of these readings must be grammatically correct. Unfortunately, in many editions of this contest, voters tend to ignore problems in the cryptic grammar of the clue, as long as they like its surface. It doesn’t reflect well for an international clue setting competition when half the voters select a clue that has an obvious grammatical problem in the cryptic reading.
I think it’s alright for setters to make mistakes and to use this contest as a sort of workshop to improve their craft. But I think voters ought to be a lot more discerning, and ought not to reward faulty grammatical constructions simply because they frequently appear in a certain publication having lax editorial standards!
It takes a community effort to keep such a competition going week after week, and I urge other participants to endeavor to maintain it at a high standard of excellence.
Monitor pandemic starting with spread of E.coli (6)
40
16
Def: Monitor. P (pandemic starting) + anagram of E.coli*
– Great surface
– strating does not work for me as a first letter indicator
– Should be pandemic’s starting or starting of pandemic
– “Pandemic starting” for P is not a grammatically correct letter selection construction. Even though it works on the surface reading, the cryptic reading is grammatically incorrect. “Starting of…” or “start of…” would be acceptable.
Keep the peace? Trump’s latest hollow “ceasefire” is about oil, stupid!
28
8
P (trumP’s latest) + CE (hollow CeasefirE) around (is about) OIL* (anag:stupid). To keep the peace = to police.
– Very nice but I think the anagrind would need to be “stupidly”
– In the cryptic reading, “[anagram fodder] stupidly” or “stupid [anagram fodder]” would both be grammatically correct. Unfortunately, what you have here is neither, even though the surface reads well.
Public organisation lacking in credible effective leaders
23
9
Acrostic &lit
– Mean but possibly justified!
– “Leaders of XYZ” is a grammatically correct letter selection construction. “XYZ leaders” may work on the surface but is grammatically faulty in the cryptic reading.
– very nice wordplay but “copper” is used to refer to one policeman. Not sure it works as definition for POLICE per se
– Copper is policeman and not police IMO. But nice clue.
– “Copper” refers to a single police officer, whereas “police” is a plural noun
Get rid of twisted agents under Trump’s control (6)
13
5
LOP< + ICE (agents under/working for Trump) = control. Lop = to cut out (Collins)
– Can’t see the def?
– “Twisted” suggests anagramming in general rather than reversal specifically, which makes the first part of this an indirect anagram
– Can’t fault the sentiment
Congrats to the toppers and all those who participated.
Over to Manish Jhaveri for the next contest.
If you have any comments or feedback on the contest or the new 1ACCWC app. or any suggestions, please leave a comment and I shall try and incorporate it.
All participants who set clues are expected to vote. You are not allowed to vote for your own clue
Click on clues to shortlist them, click on the Shortlisted Button to see shortlisted clues only
Use arrows to move clues up or down the list if you wish to. Clicking on the buttons moves the clue right to the Top or Bottom of the list.
Allocate a total of 10 points exactly across 4 clues e.g. 4,3,2,1 (ideal allocation) or 3,3,3,1 etc. A running total is visible on the top of the page to help you see what you have allocated.
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Limit of 1 clue per setter. Please Annotate your clues clearly.
Please login to participate. You can use your wordpress/gmail account for login but please use one account consistently so that your performance can be tracked for the leader board
Contest closes at 8:00 AM, April 10, 2026 after which VOTING will be open.
All participants who set clues are expected to vote as well. So please check when the Voting opens and/or bookmark the links
Voting will close at 7:00 AM, April 12, 2026 after which Results will be announced.
Of the 27 clues for INDETERMINATE, 22 clues (including the entire top ten!) contained anagrams. Interestingly, though there were a few understandable repeats, the anagrams showed quite a variety, demonstrated beautifully by the top 5 clues having unique sets of anagram fodder.
• Karol S asks us to enjoy “crumble” “AT DINNERTIME” with “E(cstasy)”
• Nitish Asthana tells us “I’M ENTERTAINED”, “drunk”
• Pundit JEE gives us a “vague form” of “INTERNET MEDIA”
• Satyen Nabar describes how a certain unnamed “R(epublican) EMITTED INANE” “rubbish” (whoever could he be talking about?)
• and, returning to top spot again after winning with ANGELIC a week earlier, Aashirwad gives us a news update about “belligerent” “leaders of I(srael) M(aking) DETENTE with IRAN” doubtful.
Congratulations to Aashirwad and all the toppers, and a big thank you to all the contestants for a great set of clues!
Belligerent leaders of Israel making detente with Iran doubtful (13)
38
13
Anagram of IM+DETENTE+IRAN, with belligerent as the anagram indicator. Doubtful is the definition (ref: Chambers Dictionary). “Detente” means ceasing of hostilities.
– Excellent!
– Liked this but I’m not 100% sure about “belligerent” as anagrind!
– While the surface reading is fine, the cryptic reading has a problem. “Rubbish” being a verb anagram indicator should come before the fodder, which would of course make your surface suffer.
(AT DINNERTIME + E)* [anag.: crumble]. Indeterminate = “unable to be predicted, calculated or deduced” (Collins) …and if you’ve never had crumble, you haven’t lived!
– Great use of crumble – which indeed delicious! 🙂
Unknown drug taken after bananas at dinner-time (13)
13
5
Def: Unknown; drug: E, anagrind: bananas => ATDINNERTIME*+E
Congrats to the toppers and all those who participated.
Over to Aashirwad for the next contest.
If you have any comments or feedback on the contest or the new 1ACCWC app. or any suggestions, please leave a comment and I shall try and incorporate it.
All participants who set clues are expected to vote. You are not allowed to vote for your own clue
Click on clues to shortlist them, click on the Shortlisted Button to see shortlisted clues only
Use arrows to move clues up or down the list if you wish to. Clicking on the buttons moves the clue right to the Top or Bottom of the list.
Allocate a total of 10 points exactly across 4 clues e.g. 4,3,2,1 (ideal allocation) or 3,3,3,1 etc. A running total is visible on the top of the page to help you see what you have allocated.
Click on submit votes. You will not be allowed to allocate more or less than 10 points/4 clues
Votes from voters whose names are not recognised from FB/Twitter/Bluesky will be disallowed. Please use your login IDs.
Participants who do not vote will lose 10 points for the round
Do check out our Leaderboards. These includes points for all players whose clues figure in the Top 10 each week and gets accumulated over the year.
Limit of 1 clue per setter. Please Annotate your clues clearly.
Please login to participate. You can use your wordpress/gmail account for login but please use one account consistently so that your performance can be tracked for the leader board
Contest closes at 10:00 AM, April 3, 2026 after which VOTING will be open.
All participants who set clues are expected to vote as well. So please check when the Voting opens and/or bookmark the links
Voting will close at 7:00 AM, April 5, 2026 after which Results will be announced.
