OVER 600 athletes from 14 years to 20 years will be seen in action in the city during the 35th West Zone Junior Athletics Championship which will be organised by Nagpur District Athletics Association under the aegis of Maharashtra Athletics Association at the synthetic track of Rashtrasant Tukadoji Maharaj Nagpur University from October 4 to 6. Addressing a press conference, Satish Uchil, Secretary, Maharashtra Athletics Association stated that men and women athletes from Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Goa, Gujarat and Chhattisgarh will be participating in the three-day meet. “Top finishers during this competition will be considered for the nationals which will be held at Bhubaneshwar later this month,” informed Uchil. Rajasthan will be represented by maximum number of participants with 151 men and women athletes.

 

“Chhattisgarh (122), Goa (50), Gujarat (117), Madhya Pradesh (120) and Maharashtra (108) make the numbers.“Maharashtra would have had a contingent of over 170 but players backed out due to inter-school district and divisional meets were they could earn grace marks. In this West Zone competition, there is no value of certificates,” explained Uchil the reason for less number of participants from Maharashtra. “Himachal Pradesh’s Kuldeep Singh and Maharashtra’s Rakesh Save will be the technical observers for the competition.

 

“Nagpur’s Ramchandra Wani has been appointed as the Event Manager. “Gujarat’s Sajid Mansure and Nagpur’s Dr Vibekanand Singh have been appointed as Technical Managers. “Dr Dhananjay Welukar has been appointed as the chairman of the organising committee,” said Dr Sharad Suryawanshi, Secretary, NDAA. Dr Pinak Dande informed that an small OPD will be operational at the venue for the safety and assistance of the athletes. Shekhar Suryawanshi said that this is for the second time that Nagpur is hosting West zone meet. “The last time the competition was held at the synthetic track of Divisional Sports Complex in Mankapur.” The organising committee includes NDAA President Gurudeo Nagrale, Umesh Naidu, Dr Sanjay Chaudhari, Archana Kottewar, Dr Sharda Naidu, Ravindra Tong, Jitendra Ghordadekar, Ganesh Wani and Nitin Dabhekar.