Twins Mansi and Manya look exactly identical and now they have surprised everyone by scoring identical marks in their class 12 examination, results of which were announced by the CBSE on Monday. They scored 95.8 per cent each, and also received the same marks in each subject.
“Everybody remembers us for identical looks and its only our names that differentiate us. We were confident about scoring well but were not hoping to score identical marks. When we analysed our performance post exams, we were hoping Manya would score more,” Mansi was quoted as saying by a news agency.
Born just nine minutes apart, the sisters, who studied at Aster Public School in Greater Noida, scored 98 in English and computer science, and received 95 each in physics, chemistry and physical education.
When we asked to comment on this, Dr Chandrakant S Pandav – Former Professor & Head of Centre for Community Medicine at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), New Delhi – said it is nothing less than a miracle and such an event is every rare.
“This is a very unprecedented event, it miracle and one cannot even imagine such things. Miracle is unexplained laws of nature and my first reaction is this is totally unimaginable miracle. The probability of such an event taking place is so rare. It’s surreal,” said Dr Pandav said.
However, Dr. Sonali Tanksale – Clinical Psychologist, AXIS Hospital, Mumbai – said that such an unprecedented thing happened because IQ of identical twins are more similar than those of fraternal twins.
“Numerous studies indicate that identical twins IQ are more similar than those of fraternal twins. Genes have a very strong influence over how certain parts of our brains develop. Numerous researchers found that certain regions of the brain were highly heritable. These included language areas, known as Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas, and the frontal region, which, among other things, plays a huge role in cognition,” Dr Tanksale said.
However, she pointed out that a lot depend on how the children are nurtured and surroundings.
“For generations intelligence is used as a predictor for numerous outcomes for the most important aspects of life such as education and occupation. Genetic influence on intelligence is substantial however several studies also indicate that intelligence is a combination of nature and nurture. Intelligence is influenced by a stimulating environment, academic exposure, family environment, enriched social environments and peer groups. All these factors together impact the manner in which children deal with and respond to situations and thus stressing the importance of both genetic and environmental influences.