Three wrestlers from state bag gold medals in national championship

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, December 1

The Senior National Wrestling Championship that started on November 29 concluded here today. On the first day, the championship started with freestyle men’s wrestling. Today, on the final day, women players showed their talent.

Shockingly, from Doaba, not even a single woman took part in the championship. It came as a surprise because Jalandhar is known as the sports hub.

From Punjab, three wrestlers won gold medals.

Gurpreet Singh, Harpreet Singh and Gursharan Kaur from Punjab won gold. Gursharan had started playing after taking a break for several years. Gursharan’s win brought happiness not only for her but also for all sports lovers because she had seen several ordeals in her life.

Her married life remained in trouble and still she gained courage and started wrestling again.

Today’s results

Asian Championship’s silver medallists Gurpreet Singh and Sunil Kumar lived up to their reputation as both clinched gold medals on the final day of the Tata Motors Senior National Wrestling Championship in Jalandhar.

This was Gurpreet’s fourth senior national title. The Punjab grappler defeated two-time World Junior Championships medallist Sajan Bhanwal, who was representing Railways, 3-1. Gurpreet continued his dominance over his younger rival and registered the fourth win in five matches played between them so far.

Enjoying the home support, Punjab’s Harpreet Singh defeated Rajbir Chhikara of Railways, with a 4-1 scoreline. This Asian Games silver medallist used his experience to dislodge his opponent’s confidence and won the title in the 82-kg category.

The three-day game saw several spectators and wrestling lovers who came from distant places remained all day at the stadium and cheered up for their favourite wrestlers.

Several family members of the wrestlers, who had come to take part in the games, had also come along with them. The parents of most of the woman wrestlers had got with them eatables and other things of need with them to help their daughters.

Sakshi Malik, the star wrestler, was accompanied with her husband.

Sakshi, Ravinder to lead Indian contingent at SAG

Meanwhile, the Indian contingent for the 2019 South Asian Games (SAG) was declared by the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) as the gold medallists at the Tata Motors Senior Wrestling National Championships were inducted in the squad. Seven-member men’s and women’s contingent will be led by Olympic medallistSakshi Malik and U-23 World Championship silver medallist Ravinder in the championship, which is starting from December 6 to December 9 in Nepal.

“The players have been chosen after an extremely competitive competition from the National platform and I am confident that the players will maintain the supremacy and defend their 2016 titles in both men and women’s category at the South Asian Games,” said Brij Bhushan Saran Singh, WFI president.