The Hindu : Sport / Wrestling : Railways looks a balanced side

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Dec 31, 2004

Sport

Sport - Wrestling

Railways looks a balanced side

By Our Sports Reporter

JIND, DEC. 30. Punjab, the ever-dominant force in wrestling, is giving a miss to this 51st National championship. Bouts involving Punjab and Haryana were always a treat, but after Kartar Singh revolted to take control before Delhi High Court stayed his accession, wrestling seemed to have gone back to the days of uncertainty.

As the election of the new body was due this year, the President of the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI), Mahendra Singh Malik brought back the Nationals to his ancestral village Nidani. The WFI's annual general meeting was due on January 2, but the faction led by Kartar Singh secured stay from the same court.

It is unfortunate that the wrestlers are made to suffer in the WFI's factional fight. The organisers were trying hard to get a team fielded for Punjab, but it would hardly be a representative side. The absence of Bengal has more to do with what happened in Puri than anything else. Bengal gave a few wrestlers from Haryana the chance to compete under its flag and unexpectedly went on to claim the honours in freestyle team championship. Haryana, which won the Greco-Roman style, was pushed out of the medal's bracket.

In the given circumstances, Railways look to be the most balanced side.

Railways has two Olympians in its ranks, Sushil Kumar (66kg) and Ramesh Kumar (74kg) and also Kripa Shankar (55kg), who almost made it to Athens. Sujit Mann (74kg) had to sit out as Commonwealth Games gold medallist Ramesh Kumar moved up in the weight category.

Services, on the other hand, promises to strike a few medals with former India coach and 1973 World champion, L. Liberman, in charge of the squad based at the Army Sports Institute, Pune.

The Belarussian, who has been tasked to prepare the junior wrestlers for the 2006 Asian Games in Doha, exudes confidence of making a dent here despite most of the wrestlers unaware of the intricacies of the new rules.

The championship finally starts on Friday with competition in three weight categories, in both freestyle and Greco-Roman - 50kg, 66kg and 96kg.

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