I was wrongfully flagged for plagiarism in the Starters 149B contest, and I wanted to share my experience. During the contest, I worked through several different approaches before arriving at my final solution. Unfortunately, my final solution coincidentally aligned with another participant’s, which led to our codes being flagged as similar. However, this was purely coincidental, and I want to emphasize that I developed my solution independently.
I reached out to CodeChef support for clarification, but I haven’t received a response, and instead, my rank was dropped. This is especially disheartening because I’ve worked incredibly hard to reach 3-star status—it took me nearly a year to get there.
I fully respect CodeChef’s rules and the importance of fair play, but I believe this penalty was applied in error. Has anyone else faced a similar issue, and how did you resolve it? Any guidance on how to escalate this would be greatly appreciated.