National under-18 softball tourney begins

National under-18 softball tourney begins
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The Pilgrim City is organising the 36th National under-18 soft ball championship from June 3 to 7. For the first time, the game was earlier started in Rajasthan in 1961 which later spread to other places in the country.

Tirupati: The Pilgrim City is organising the 36th National under-18 soft ball championship from June 3 to 7. For the first time, the game was earlier started in Rajasthan in 1961 which later spread to other places in the country.

Dr Dasarath mal Mehta was considered to be the father of Indian Soft ball. The CEO of Softball Association of India, Pravin Anaokar told The Hans India that the association has been striving to make it more popular. It was included in the schedule for Japan Olympics to be held in 2020. Already it was part of Asian games and several worldwide federations have been conducting various championships at different levels.

But all federations organise Junior, sub junior and senior championships whereas the Softball Association of India has started Pony(Protect Our Nation’s Youth) mini soft ball tournaments for under 10, 11, 12 and 13 children to give them better exposure and made them compete at national and international levels. For every age group there are training programmes and championships, he said.

“We have been inviting teams from West Asia and SAARC countries for promoting the game further” he maintained. He lauded the Chittoor district Softball Association and AP Softball Association for hosting this championship and for making arrangements.

AP State has given many world level players in this sport in a short time. An umpire and coordinator of Maharashtra contingent Mukul Deshpande has said that more and more persons have been coming forward to play this sport.

Minister for Sports and Youth Services Kollu Ravindra and Minister for Industries N Amarnath Reddy have inaugurated the Championship at SV University Tarakarama Stadium on Sunday after a colourful march past by players from 26 states.

A huge number of 1000 people consisting of players, umpires, coaches and other personnel are participating. The event has been jointly organised by AP Softball Association and Chittoor District Softball Association.

District Collector PS Pradyumna, ZP Chairperson S Geervani, Tirupati MLA M Suguna, TUDA Chairman G Narasimha Yadav, Member of SAAP B Sridhar Varma, President of AP Softball Association T Shanmugam and others were present at the inaugural function.

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