400 players shine at 7th Mayank Sharma Memorial Punjab Open Badminton Championship
Ferozepur, December 11, 2024: The seventh Mayank Sharma Memorial Punjab Open Badminton Championship, organised by the Mayank Foundation, concluded on a high note at the Rai Bahadur Vishnu Bhagwan Auditorium of Das & Brown World School. The three-day event promoting youth participation in sports saw over 400 players from Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, Rajasthan, Jammu, and Chandigarh competing in under-13, 15, and 17 age categories.
Organised in collaboration with the Punjab and District Badminton Association, the championship was held under the leadership of Dr. Anirudh Gupta, head of the Mayank Foundation, and showcased remarkable talent and enthusiasm among young athletes.
Mayank Foundation founder Deepak Sharma said that on the first day of the championship's inaugural ceremony, industrialist Sameer Mittal, Ferozepur Medicity Director Subodh Kakkar and Bharat Vikas Parishad Provincial President Victor Chhabra along with their teams participated as chief guests.
On the second day of the championship, Red Cross secretary Ashok Bahl, Principal Rajinder Singh Gill Nawanshahr, Wings Global's Amit Arora, Manjit Singh Khara, Janu Gillhotra, social worker Vipul Narang participated. Dr Kamal Bagi attended the closing ceremony as the Chief Guest, while Punjab Badminton Association Secretary Anupam Kumaria, Chitranjan Bansal, Vinay Vohra, Ashok Wadhera, Tinku Gupta, Sanjay Kataria, Harish Monga, Zira Municipality President Gurpreet Singh Judge, Dr Sheth Sethi, Dr Lavi Dhawan of Siddi Vinayak Hospital, businessman Sukhbir Kamboj, Dr Rohit Garg, Sunny Handa were specially present.
Project in-charge Rakesh Kumar and Ashwini Sharma said that the players were very enthusiastic to participate in this tournament held in the Rai Bahadur Vishnu Bhagwan Auditorium of Das & Brown World School.
He said that in the tournament, the winning team was given a cash prize of Rs. 15,000 and the first runner-up was given a cash prize of Rs. 11,000, besides trophies and other incentives. He said that to make the championship successful, Ravi Chauhan's 7-member team came specially from Delhi, who conducted all the matches in a great manner.
Sharma said, the tournament was held in the memory of Mayank for the last seven years in the memory of young badminton player Mayank Sharma, who died in a road accident in the year 2017. Mayank was a good badminton player and to keep his memory fresh and prepare excellent badminton players like him, the Mayank Foundation was formed. The foundation is not only doing sports but also special work is being done on painting programs, and traffic rules apart from scholarships to needy students in the field of education.
In the championship, Ridhima Saini Chandigarh was the winner in the under-17 girls category and Sania Jalandhar city was the runner-up. In the under-17 boys category, Samarth Bhardwaj Jalandhar and Shivansh Puri Jalandhar were the winners; in the under-15 girls category, Riddhima Saini Chandigarh and Anvi Rai Chandigarh; in the under-15 boys category, Kaivalya Sood Amritsar and Aarav Porwal Amritsar; in the under-13 girls category, Onika Goyal Mohali and Sukh Sehaj Kaur Mohali; in the boys category, Ansh Vats Sonipat and Yuvraj Kalra Fazilka were the winners.
Apart from Dass & Brown Principal Dr Rajesh Kumar Chandel, Dr Celine, Sajal Bhattacharya, Secretary Rajiv Setia, Jaswant Saini, Ashwini Sharma, Sandeep Sehgal, Yogesh Talwar, Manoj Gupta, Vikas Gumbar, Deepak Mathwal, Harinder Bhullar, Arun Arora, Kamal Sharma, Aksha Kumar, Gursahib Singh, Arnish Monga, Aasim Agarwal, Tushar Agarwal, Vikas Agarwal, Rupinder Singh, Deepak Grover, Jaswant Saini and others were present to make the programme successful.