City cager carving a niche

Anil Datt

Ludhiana, December 16

Prerna Dawar has carved a niche for herself in the badminton arena by clinching top honours in the singles and doubles categories in the sub-junior and junior state championships during the last couple of years.

Prerna (16), a student of Class XII at Kundan Vidya Mandir (KVM), Civil Lines, took up the game in 2011. After finishing at the victory podium in the district-level tournaments, she got selected to participate in the state-level competition in the sub-junior section.

Prerna did not disappoint the selection authorities, as she performed well in the state championship. She performed consistently by emerging champion in the Punjab State and Punjab Ranking Badminton Tournaments.

She found an ideal partner in Siya Sharma, also a student of KVM, with the pair continuing to annex the title in the doubles section. The duo has been dominating the proceedings on the basis of which Prerna and Siya found berths in the Punjab squads for the National Schools Competition since 2012.

Prerna also got the chance to represent the state badminton contingent in the North Zone and National Tournaments in 2017. Though she could not secure any position, she had the match exposure against national and international-level players.

A trainee of badminton coach Sandeep Singh Saini, Prerna played a pivotal role in Punjab team’s title win in the U-14 section in the National Schools’ Badminton Tournaments at Chandigarh (2013); Aurangabad (2015) and at Kadappa, Andhra Pradesh (2017).

Presently, Prerna is participating in the 43rd Junior National Badminton Championship-2018 at Lucknow (December 16-22).

Principal Navita Puri lauded her for her outstanding achievements in the field of badminton. She wished her more success in future competitions. She also lauded coach Sandeep Singh Saini for his guidance in bringing fame to the school and her parents as well.