Khelo India School Games: Haryana Stays On Top Of Medals Tally, Delhi Lie Second

Haryana stayed on top despite not adding any more to their overnight tally of 20 gold medals, though Delhi narrowed the gap to just two at the first Khelo India School games. Late on Sunday, Delhi won the Boys Kabaddi gold medal and on Monday, they added the Boys Volleyball gold to move to 18 medals, while Maharashtra are lying third with 16 gold and Karnataka have 15. West Bengal opened their gold medal with two successes on Monday. The Bengal girls won the volleyball gold and in the evening they added one more gold through weightlifter Shrabani Das in Girls 48 kg category.

Of the four weight categories in weightlifting, Assam (Sidhanta Gogoi in Boys 56 kg), Odhisa (Bhaktaram Desti in Boys 50kg), Bengal (Shrabani Das in Girls 48kg) and Manipur (Konsam Ormila Devi in Girls 44 kg) shared the honours.

In weightlifting the star of the day, Konsam Ormila Devi from Manipur, a Commonwealth Youth Championship winner, who won the 44 kg category, was the pick. She won the gold with a big margin in the girls' 44kg category.

The Commonwealth Youth Championship winner lifted a combined total of 137 kg, four kilos better than 133kg she achieved at Gold Coast in the Commonwealth meet last September. On Monday, Ormila achieved 59 kg in snatch and 78 kg with clean & Jerk for a total of 137 kg.

Delhi Boys and West Bengal Girls grabbed the volleyball gold medals in their respective sections. While the Boys finals went the full distance, West Bengal beat Maharashtra in straight games.

Delhi won the Boys final 3-2 and Bengal Girls beat Maharashtra 3-0, while Kerala beat Uttarakhand for Boys bronze and Gujarat beat UP for Girls bronze.

In the Girls final, West Bengal girls continued their winning spree at the IG Indoor Stadium. The West Bengal girls, who had won the National School Games at Andhra Pradesh last October, once again beat the same opponents Maharashtra.

Delhi won the kabaddi gold for boys beating Uttar Pradesh in the final on Sunday, while Himachal Pradesh beat Delhi in the Girls final.

Badminton: Top-Seeded Dhruv Rawat, Malvika Bansod Sail Smoothly Into Second Round

Top-seeded Dhruv Rawat (Uttarakhand) and Malvika Bansod (Maharashtra) made light of the challenge of their respective opponents in the boys and girls' singles opening round matches when the badminton competition got under way at the Indira Gandhi Stadium on Monday.

"I told myself that there was no room for complacency and that the match was not won until the last point went in my favour," said Dhruv Rawat after beating wild-card entrant Subanshu Tiwari (Arunachal Pradesh) 21-5, 21-3 in a mere 17 minutes. "I remembered the Asian Badminton Championship match (against Taufik Hidayat Ilmi) when I lost because I assumed a win after taking the first game."

Nagpur's Malvika Bansod, fresh from winning a senior all-India ranking crown, took 20 minutes to book her pre-quarterfinal berth with a 21-10, 21-7 win against Tamil Nadu's V Sarumarthi. Gayathri Gopichand, seeded third in the girls' draw, pulled out as she is recovering from an injury. Rajasthan's Anuska secured a walk-over into the round of 16.

Results (first round, seedings in brackets)

Boys singles: (1) Dhruv Rawat (Uttarakhand) beat Subhanshu Tiwari (Arunachal Pradesh) 21-5, 21-3; Govind Krishna (Kerala) beat Anirudh Khushwaha (Gujarat) 21-19, 21-19; (6) Koya Sai Charan (Telangana) beat Sourav (Assam( 21-7, 21-10; Anush Rav Garg (Haryana) w.o. George Kherban (Meghalaya); R Vikas Prabhu (Tamil Nadu) w.o. (3) Iman Sonowal (Assam); Laa Takum (Arunachal Pradesh) beat Aryaman Goel (Madhya PradesH0 21-6, 21-14; (7) Aakash Yadav (Delhi) beat Sudanshu Bure (Maharashtra( 21-9, 21-8; Rajan Yadav (Uttar Pradesh) beat Pruthvi K Roy (Karnataka) 22-20, 21-8.

Girls singles: (1) Malvika Bansod (Maharashtra) beat V Sarumathi (Tamil Nadu) 21-10, 2-17; Varsha Venkatesh (Kerala) beat Shejal Joshi (Meghalaya) 21-7, 2-13; (8) Mansi Singh (Uttar Pradesh) beat L Mamakiya (Andhra Pradesh) 21-6, 21-2; Nikita (Haryana) beat Taku Neha (Arunachal Pradesh) 21-5, 2-15; (4) Unnati Bisht (Uttarakhand) beat Amrit Bashini (Puducherry) 21-8, 21-3; Debahuti Lahon (Assam) beat Sheetal Joshi (Meghalaya) 21-9, 21-5; (6) Trisha Hegde (Karnataka) beat Mansi Yadav (Delhi) 21-10, 21-9; Tanishka Das Pandey (Maharashtra) beat BB Bimby (Tamil Nadu) 21-11, 21-11.

Manipur International Babyrojisana Chanu Lays Down The Gauntlet

Manipur's Babyrojisana Chanu, who recently won gold for India in the seventh Nation's Cup boxing tournament in Serbia, wasted little time in asserting her superiority over Harshita (Delhi) and forced the referee to stop the contest in the first round of their bout at the boxing hall in the Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium on Monday.

It came as no surprise that Chanu was the clear winner in the girls' 52kg class. Daughter of Robindro Naorem, she will face Assam's Nanjita Baro in the quarterfinalstomorrow.

Another closely fought encounter saw Goa's Suman Yadav inch past Arunachal Pradesh's Dare Runchi with a 3-2 split decision. "My current coach came to our school to demonstrate the sport," she said. "I tried out my hand at boxing as it looked appealing. One year has gone by since and I cannot imagine my life now without boxing"

Three boxers from the Union Territory of Daman & Diu participated but only Risabham Mishra progressed. He did well to outperform Himachal's Akshay Verma in the 75kg class and was ruled winner after the first round. His team-mates Himanshu Singh (54kg class) and Anurag Sanjay Singh (57kg class) were eliminated

Konsam Ormila Devi Lifting The Weight Of Expectation With A Touch Of Class

Konsam Ormila Devi from Manipur, who arrived with a big reputation, lived up to the expectations. She won the gold with a big margin in the girls' 44kg category on Monday at the Indira Gandhi Stadium.

The Commonwealth Youth Championship winner lifted a combined total of 137 kg, four kilos better than 133kg she achieved at Gold Coast in the Commonwealth meet last September. On Monday, Ormila achieved 59 kg in snatch and 78 kg with clean & Jerk for a total of 137 kg.

Her coach, T Bobo Singh, hopes that with the kind of talent young Ormila is blessed with, she should be able to follow in the footsteps of the illustrious weightlifters from Manipur like Kunjurani Devi and Sanamacha Chanu.

This win at the Khelo India School Games could well be the first step in the long journey to medals at the highest levels.

Ormila, whose total was 10 kg better than silver medallist, Khushali Gangurde of Maharashtra (Total of 127 kg), revealed that she expected a much closer fight. "I thought she (Khushali) would give a fight, but she didn't succeed in her last two attempts," she said.

Hailing from Khongjom, a small village 35km outside of Manipur's capital city of Imphal, Ormila has risen from humble beginnings. She picked up weightlifting at the insistence of coach Bobo Singh, a former coach at the Sports Authority of India academy in the state.

"Her mother is a vegetable vendor in Khongjom, and her father is very ill," he said of his talented ward. "Her cousin used to play football. That is how I discovered her at the SAI academy, where I persuaded her to take up weightlifting."

Singh credited her rapid rise through the ranks in such a short time span of to her hard work. "I spotted her in 2013, and it is great to see her having done so well in the past four years or so. I had told her to give me two years, and we have come a long way since then."

Ormila, who also won gold in the Asian Youth Championship, is currently balancing studies, competitive weightlifting as well as attending to her ill father, but has her sights set on the National Youth championships later this month.

"I study in the ninth standard, and the school where I come from doesn't have many facilities for sports, so I have to train at the academy," she explains.

Her coach, now a physical education teacher, is devoting all the time he can towards his young ward in her journey to become a future international medal contender. "The national championships are coming up in Vishakhapatnam later this month, so we are focusing on that," explains her coach. "Her selection for international competitions will depend on her performance there."