Khelo India Youth Games Day 11 Roundup: Haryana display Kabaddi supremacy with gold medals in Boys and Girls events

As many as four youth national records were broken in weightlifting.

Four more national youth records went down in weightlifting, of which three were created by Haryana weightlifter Sanjana alone, as Maharashtra continued to top the medal tally with 44 golds, at the end of Day 11 of the ongoing Khelo India Youth Games 2022 Madhya Pradesh (KIYG2022MP). Haryana (38 golds) and MP (28 golds) are in second and third positions. Also in the day, hosts Madhya Pradesh (M.P) made it through to both the hockey finals, scheduled for Friday, February 10, 2023.

Records continue to tumble in Weightlifting

The weightlifting arena created at the Basketball Complex in Indore has been a happy hunting ground for new national youth records and Thursday, saw as many as four of them tumble. R. Harini, who gave Puducherry their first gold of the games by winning the Girls 71kg category, recorded a total lift of 170kg (76kg in snatch and 94kg in clean and jerk) to set a new national youth mark.

The star of the day however was undoubtedly Haryana’s Sanjana who won the Girls 76kg with a monstrous total of 195kg. To put things in perspective, Manipur’s Chaoba Chanu’s silver was at 176kg. Sanjana created youth national records in Snatch, Clean and Jerk as well as in total lift and broke a total of seven records en route to gold.

Among the other weightlifting winners on the day were Sanidhya More (Boys 89kg) of Maharashtra and Dilbag Singh (Boys 96kg) of Punjab.

MP in both hockey finals

At the MP Women’s Hockey Academy turf in Gwalior, the hosts had a super day making it to both the Boys and Girls finals. The Girls first beat Haryana 2-0, with a brace in the third quarter by their tournament top scorer Bhumiksha. She got her first through a penalty corner and the second, a brilliant individual field goal from the top of the box, to win it for her team. They go on to face Jharkhand, who were 3-1 winners over Odisha in the second semi-final.

It was then the turn of the MP Boys and in front of a raucous stadium packed to the brim, they did not disappoint. In a clinical display, they dismantled hockey powerhouses Punjab 5-1. This was after the Odisha boys took revenge on behalf of their girls, beating Jharkhand 1-0 to make the title decider.

Haryana supreme in Kabaddi

Haryana won both the Kabaddi golds at the Abhay Prashal in Indore. The boy’s outplayed Delhi 42-25 in the final while in the Girls final, the Haryana girls edged out Maharashtra 30-29 in a tight contest.

It was in-fact Haryana’s day at the KIYG2022MP as they won as many as eight golds on the day. Besides the two golds in Kabaddi, they picked up a further two in Wrestling and also won three golds in Rowing.  They also won a gold in Fencing, winning the women’s saber team competition.

Kerala have a good day

Kerala also had a good day at the Khelo India Youth games, picking up as many as five golds. They won two in Rowing winning both the Boys and Girls Coxless Fours and then in Jabalpur, Agxa Ann Thomas struck gold in the Girls individual Cycling Road Race. The silver went to Pooja Danole of Maharashtra and bronze to Bhavana Patil of Karnataka. Kedar Patel of Gujarat won the Boys race with Kerala and Jammu & Kashmir winning silver and bronze respectively.

Kerala also won two golds in their traditional martial art Kalarippayattu. Amrutha MV and Nandana KR won the Girls Long Staff Fight competition while Sidharth and Adhithyan won the corresponding Boys competition. MP also won a gold in Kalarippayattu when Gourav Dangi won the Boys High Kick competition. That effort pulled them up to the fifth position on the medal tally with 11 golds, above Odisha and below fourth-placed Rajasthan (14 golds).

Other results

Medals also came thick and fast at the Upper Lake area in Bhopal. Gourav Kumar of Uttarakhand won the day’s first at the lake with a win in the Boy’s Single Scull. In the Boy’s Coxless Pair, Sumit Kumar Swain and Ravi Bedwal of Odisha struck gold, while Haryana won the Girl’s Double Scull. In the Girls Single Scull, Moniak Bhadoria won yet another gold for the hosts in water sports. Rohit Bedwal then helped Haryana with a couple of more golds in the Boys Scull events. Finally, Punjab also picked up Rowing gold.

Manipur and Punjab also picked up gold in Fencing events. In Judo, Punjab, Maharashtra, Uttarakhand, Delhi and Rajasthan won a gold each, while the two golds in Mallakhamb at Ujjain’s Madhav Seva Nyas Hall were shared between Maharashtra (Tanshree Suresh Jadhav- Girl’s Pole event) and hosts M.P (Devendra Patidar- Boys Rope event).

In the eight Swimming medal events at Bhopal’s Prakash Tarun Pushkar, Maharashtra won three golds while Karnataka bagged two. One gold each was won by West Bengal, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu.

Friday, Day 12 of the games, will also see the conclusion of the three indigenous sports of Thang-ta (Mandla), Kalarripayattu (Gwalior) and Mallakhamb (Ujjain). The final medals for Fencing (Jabalpur), Judo (Bhopal) and Weightlifting (Indore) will also be decided on what promises to be an action-packed Day 12 of the games.