Golden haul by Haryana; Kamal adjudged best boxer

By Our Special Correspondent

GURGAON, DEC. 24. Much to the delight of a large Sunday crowd, Haryana boxers claimed five gold medals and a silver and duly annexed the team championship in the 33rd National junior boxing championship at the Government School ground here.

The host's gold rush, which began with the afternoon's first bout featuring Robin Dev in the light fly weight category, ended with Ravinder winning the concluding contest in the super heavy weight section.

In between, only Manoj Kumar failed to live up to expectations when he went down to Madhya Pradesh's Harpal Sandhu on points in light heavy weight category.

Though Haryana accumulated 42 points for the overall honours, the `best boxer' prize went to Bengal's Muztaba Kamal.

Winner of the silver medal in the Children of Asia meet in Russia and bronze in the Brandenburg Cup in Germany this year, Kamal had little difficulty in proving his superiority as he toyed with Chandigarh's Dharam Singh in the bantam weight final.

Andhra Pradesh's talented youngster, E. Ranjit, was adjudged the `best loser.' Ranjit lost a close 12-15 decision to Sanjay Kumar of Haryana in the welter weight final.

There were very few well-contested bouts today. In the best one of the day, Mizoram's L.R. Sanga Pachua prevailed over Man Bahadur Thapa of Services when the referee stopped the contest in the third round.

Pachua began aggressively and often caught Thapa with fine left- right combinations. Thapa, too, had his moments and managed to throw some good punches. However, repeated blows by Pachua to Thapa's head brought the contest to a premature close.

Thapa was the only boxer from Services not to win a gold for his team today. His three colleagues-Rohit Thapa (feather), Hardeep Singh (light middle) and Gurmail Singh (middle)-scored comfortable victories and helped the team finish second best in the team championship.

The results (all finals):

Light fly weight: Robin Dev (Har) bt Arun Singh (Pun) on points.

Fly weight: Divakar (SPSB) bt Suwdi Raju (AP) on points.

Bantam weight: Muztaba Kamal (Ben) bt Dharam Singh (Chd) 18-6.

Feather weight: Rohit Thapa (SSCB) bt Mohammad Athteshamddin (AP) 8-5.

Light weight: L.R. Sanga Pachua (Miz) bt Man Bahadur Thapa (SSCB) RSC (H) third round.

Light welter weight: Parvinder Singh (Har) bt S. Ning Thousaing (Mani), retired first round.

Welter weight: Sanjay Kumar (Har) bt E. Ranjit (AP) 15-12.

Light middle weight: Hardeep Singh (SSCB) bt Amandeep Singh (Pun) 10-0.

Middle weight: Gurmail Singh (SSCB) bt E. Balram (Kar) RSC first round.

Light heavy weight: Harpal Sandhu (MP) bt Manoj Kumar (Har) 21- 10.

Heavy weight: Puneet Yadav (Har) bt Sandeep Dagar (Del) 6-3 second round.

Super heavy weight: Ravinder (Har) bt Gurpreet Pal Singh (Pun) RSC (OC) second round.

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Section  : Sport
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