Four-day national athletics meet inaugurated

Pomp and Pageantry marked the gala opening of the 19th Federation Cup national senior athletics championships at the Mangala Stadium here today.
With high octane competitions scheduled for the next four days, the opening ceremony today witnessed glamour and colour spread out through an impressive cultural fest displayed by the entertaining performers from all over the country that followed the usual March Past of the participating athletics teams.
Big time athletics is returning to this venue after 28 years. Earlier in 1987, Mangala Stadium hosted the Open Nationals that witnessed the emergence of Ashwini Nachappa as the new sprint queen of the country after the legendary PT Usha.

Margaret Alwa, the union sports minister of that time was instrumental in hosting the above championships.
It is another Mangalorean, Abhaychandra Jain, the present Sports Minister of the State who brought the Federation Cup this time.
The Federation Cup, dubbed as a selection trials for the Indian aspirants looking to take part in the Asian Athletics Championships at Wuhan (China), will see them trying to earn their berths from tomorrow onwards.

As much as 1,040 athletes representing 36 teams are taking part in the four-day meet.
The list of entries shows there are nineteen reigning FedCup champions looking to defend their title at Mangaluru.

Prominent among them are Haryana shot putter Inderjeet Singh, silver medalist in the World University Games, two years ago and Maharashtra steeplechaser Lalita Babar who had won a bronze medal in last year's Asian Games at Incheon in men and women categories respectively.
This apart, national high jump record-holder Sahana Kumari, the flag-bearer of host-state Karnataka will be another star attraction of the meet as she is not only looking the defend her title here but also going for her seventh gold medal in her favourite event in Federation Cup.
The third place performance of the previous Asian championships held at Pune, in 2013, shall be considered for the purpose of selecting the team for Wuhan.

Interestingly the qualification period for Rio Olympics in 2016 will also commence on May 1, the opening day of this year's Federation Cup here.
Earlier the inaugural ceremony was graced by a large number of dignitaries that include Deshpandey (Hon'ble Minister for Education), Ramnath Rai (Minister for Forests), Abhaychandra Jain (Sports Minister) in presence of AFI President Adille Sumariwala, Secreatry C K Valson and Karnataka Athletics Association president G Parameshwara.