Grand treble for Rashmi in Media TT

Patna, July 28, 2010: Rashmi Pandey of Hindi daily Hindustan clinched a grand treble winning women singles, doubles and mixed doubles titles in the Strawberry Kids Play School inter-media table tennis tournament at the Bihar Young Men’s Institute here on Wednesday.

Rashmi won the women’s singles title beating her teammate Shurti Kishore 6-11, 11-7 and 13-11. Earlier Rashmi pairing with Shruti Kishore got the women doubles titles defeating Vijaya Singh (i next) and Sonali Chhaya (Prabhat Khabar) 11-8, 11-5 in the final on Tuesday.

In the mixed doubles final, Rashmi partnering with Prashant Kakkar (Hindustan) beat Rajesh Kumar and Shruti Kishore (also from Hindustan) by 11-7, 3-11, 20-18 to bag the crown.

Neeraj Kumar Sinha of All India Radio (AIR) annexed a grand double in the men’s section winning men’s singles and doubles titles.

Niraj Kumar Sinha of Akashvani tamed teammate Jagmohan Gehlot 11-3 and 11-6 in the singles, while he together with Jagmohan defeated another colleague S K Sinha and Rahul Shankar 11-7, 11-9 in the doubles.

Former Bihar women TT champion Papiya D Gandhi and former Bihar men’s champion Dilip Kumar Gandhi gave away the prizes. On the occasion, Sports Journalists Association of Bihar (SJAB) felicitated the two legends of Bihar table tennis Dilip and Papyia. Senior vice-president of SJAB, Adhikari MM Prasad felicitated Papiya D Gandhi while director of Strawberry Kids Play School Kumar Pranay honoured Dilip Kumar Gandhi by presenting them mementos.

Syed Shabab Anwar, executive member, SJAB gave away the prizes to winners and runners-up of mixed doubles event.

SJAB secretary Pradeep Modak welcomed the guests. Abhijeet Biswas, treasurer, SJAB, proposed a vote of thanks. Arun Kumar Singh, Manoj Kumar Sinha, Navin Chandra Manoj, Amarnath, Shailendra Kumar Sinha (all office-bearers of SJAB), Mukesh Roy, secretary, Bihar Table Tennis Association, Mirtunjay Tiwari, president, RJD sports cell, Kumar Vijay, president, JD (U) sports cell, sports organizer Santosh Tiwari, athletic coach Abhishek Kumar and national TT players Somnath Roy and Rinki Ghosh were present at the function.

The five-day championship was organised by SJAB with technical supports from Bihar Table Tennis Association.

Photo caption: Winners of Strawberry Kids Play School inter-media table tennis tournament pose for a group photograph in Patna on July 28, 2010.
Photo: Aftab Alam Siddiqui