Glasgow: India launched their campaign at the 20th Commonwealth Games with a flourish with weightlifters K Sanjita Chanu and S Mirabai Chanu (both of Manipur) bagging a gold and silver, respectively, in a display of overwhelming domination, while the judokas added two silver medals on the opening day of competition on Thursday.
In women’s 48kg weightlifting on the opening day of competitions, Sanjita won with a total lift of 173kg (77+96), while Mirabai grabbed the silver with a cumulative effort of 170kg (75+95) in the absence of other strong competitors.
Nigeria’s Nkechi Opara was a distant third with 162kg (70+92).
Sanjita’s total of 173kg missed the Games record, held in the name of 2010 CWG gold winner Augustina Nkem Nwaokolo (175kg) by two kilogrammes. Sanjita’s 77kg effort in the snatch, however, equalled Nwaokolo’s CWG record.
The contest was all but over at the halfway snatch stage with 20-year-old Sanjita and 19-year-old Mirabai lifting 77kg and 75kg while Opara could come up with 70kg. The Nigerian’s attempt to give a fight to the Indian duo failed as she could not lift 75kg in her third attempt in snatch.
It was basically a contest between the two Manipuris in an event that India has dominated for a long time at the Commonwealth Games from the days of Kunjarani Devi.
Judokas Navjot Chana and Shushila Likmabam had to be content with a silver medal each after they failed to clear the final hurdle in the men’s 60kg and women’s 48kg events, respectively.
There was a bronze medal for another judoka, Kalpana Thoudam, who won on the basis of conceding fewer penalty points against Christianne Legentil of Mauritius.
India’s paddlers, shuttlers and squash players had easy outings, meanwhile.
Manjeet Nandal, however, returned empty-handed after losing his bronze medal bout.
In the men’s 60kg event, Chana, a 2010 Commonwealth Championships gold medallist, lost to Ashley McKenzie of England in the final. The Indian lost on the basis of penalty points (shido). Chana was handed three penalty points as against one by the Englishman. Both earned the same number of wazari points.
Likmabam showed tremendous form en route to the final round by knocking out her rivals on Ippon verdicts. She was no match, however, for Scotland’s Kimberly Renicks in the final.
The local judoka, egged on by her home fans, knocked down the Indian in the third minute of the final round bout with an Ippon (knock-out) verdict.
Likmaban had earlier defeated Amy Meyer of Australia in 2 minutes and 38 seconds in the quarterfinals while she got better of Mani Medza Effe of Cameroon in a minute and 41 seconds in the pre-quarterfinals.
While the swimmers and cyclists failed to make much of an impact, it turned out to be a relatively sweat-free day for the paddlers, shuttlers and squash players as they trounced their first round opponents.
In badminton, India spanked minnows Ghana 5-0 in a Group B match of the mixed team event.
The Indian men and women’s table tennis team made a comfortable start by defeating Vanuatu and Barbados respectively at the Scotstoun Sports Campus.
In squash, India’s Anaka Alankamony, Harinder Pal Sandhu and Mahesh Mangaonkar won their respective opening singles convincingly.
Sajan Prakash failed to advance to the men’s 400m freestyle final after clocking 3:59:29 in his heat. Prakash came fourth in heat number 2 but finished 20th overall in a field of 28 swimmers.
In the men’s 100m freestyle S9, para swimmer Prasanta Karmakar, who had won a bronze medal at the 2010 CWG, clocked 1.04.86 to qualify for the final after finishing fourth in heat.
Indian cyclists did not have an ideal start to their campaign as they failed to qualify for the finals of both men’s sprint event and men’s 400m team pursuit on the opening day of the track cycling competition.
In the men’s sprint qualifying round, three Indians – Amarjit Nagi, Amrit Singh and Alan Baby finished a poor 22nd, 23rd and 25th, respectively in a field of 28 cyclists.
India also finished at the bottom in the qualifying round of the men’s 4000 metres team pursuit. (PTI)