The Hindu : Sport : Pankaj Advani named for Khel Ratna

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Aug 18, 2006

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Sport

Pankaj Advani named for Khel Ratna

Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI: World billiards champion Pankaj Advani has been recommended for the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna award for the year 2005.

Winner of two titles, under different formats, in the World billiards championship last year, apart from the Asian title, Advani was considered the front-runner in the race for the coveted Khel Ratna award for the most outstanding performance of the year.

His closest contender was expected to be India's cricket captain Rahul Dravid. However, with the Board apparently failing to meet the deadline of May 31 for submission of recommendations, his name did not even come up when a committee, headed by former Board of Control for Cricket in India President Raj Singh Dungarpur, finalised the awardees' list here on Thursday.

The panel also selected 15 sportspersons for the Arjuna Award. Nine-time National badminton champion Aparna Popat, who had not been considered for the award for several years — rather unfairly according to many observers — following her positive test for a stimulant at the 1999 Uber Cup qualifiers here, is among those named.

Hari Krishna overlooked

Grandmaster Hari Krishna has been overlooked while giving the honour in chess to another Grandmaster, Surya Shekhar Ganguly. Hari Krishna, a higher-rated player than Ganguly, has had a fabulous year in 2005 and his success included the title in the Sanjin tournament in China, in a tough field. The chess federation had nominated three names, Abhijit Kunte being the third.

From among the four names forwarded by the athletics federation, quarter-miler K. M. Binu, shot putter Bahadur Singh, high jumper Bobby Aloysius and 400m runner Manjeet Kaur, the last-named got the vote. Manjeet had won the one-lap event at the last Asian championships in Incheon, Korea, and was also part of the gold-winning longer relay team.

For the third year running, Aloysius finds herself left behind, though in her collection of medals she also has an Asian gold, an Asian Games silver and an assortment of other medals.

Archers

Archers Tarundeep Rai and Dola Banerjee, table tennis player Soumyadeep Roy, wrestler Sushil Kumar, who won the Commonwealth championship in 2003 and 2005, boxer Akhil Kumar who was the Commonwealth champion in 2005 and Commonwealth Games champion in Melbourne, woman cricketer Anju Jain, rifle shooter Gagan Narang, who won the Asian championship last year apart from the Commonwealth Games gold this year, women's billiards world champion Anuja Thakur, hockey pivot Viren Rasquinha and woman swimmer Shikha Tandon, are among the others recommended for the Arjuna Award.

For the second year running, no cricketer has been chosen for the Arjuna Award. The BCCI had announced that it had recommended the names of Irfan Pathan and Yuvraj Singh. It is not known whether these names had also reached the ministry well past the deadline.

Hockey Olympian Nandy Singh and athlete Uday Prabhu are among the four recommended for the Dhyan Chand award.

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