SUBHASH MISHRA
Dhanbad, Aug 24: Top-seeded Niraj Kesri of Ranchi began his title campaign in fashion by beating Akhil Chouhan of Jamshedpur in the first round of the Jharkhand State under-17, under-15 badminton championship which kick-started at Dhanbad indoor stadium today.
Niraj beat Akhil 15-06, 15-09. In the under-15 boys’ singles event, Jamshedpur’s Krish Dubey defeated Satwik Choudhary of Ranchi by 15-04, 15-05.
In other encounters of under 15 boys’ event, Sujal Rakshit of Dhanbad beat Pekma Bhutia of Ranchi 15-06, 15-05 while Ankit Kumar of Bokaro beat Samrat Bose of Dhanbad by 15-12, 15-05. Mandip Kumar of Ranchi defeated Satvik Kumar of Dhanbad 9-15, -15-08, 15-14.
Earlier, senior divisional commerce manager of Dhanbad Rail Division Amresh Kumar and joint secretary of Badminton Association of India cum secretary Jharkhand Badminton Association K Prabhakar Rao jointly inaugurated the championship.
On the occasion, Dhanbad Badminton Association senior vice-president Rakesh Tiwari, Satish Kumar, vice-president Rajesh Kumar Jha, secretary Samrat Choudhary, Riyaj Khan and Parimal Singh were also present.
National grade umpires Avinash Kumar Tiwari is the match referee and Washim Akram (both from Ranchi) is the match controller. Besides them, Madhusudan of Dumka, A Amulya (Ranchi), Kamaljit Kaur (Jamshedpur), Abhishek Kumar, Priyadarshi and Mittu Verma (all Dhanbad) are conducting the matches.
