I was back on All India Radio’s Sports Scan, the half-hour bulletin of sports news, on November 6, 2011, coinciding with the opening day of the first Test in the India-West Indies cricket series. It was natural that cricket took up much of the time that the host Shivendra Chaturvedi and I devoted on the show.
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It was a pleasure and privilege, being part of All India Radio’s Sports Scan on Tuesday, October 11, 2011. There were a lot of sporting events that came up for discussion.
The National Boxing Championship for Women in Bhopal came up first since MC Mary Kom’s clash with defending champion Sarita Devi in the 51kg class will hold enormous interest, given that the five-time world champion in the 46kg class, is eyeing a berth in the Indian team for the Olympic Games in London next year.
The show’s host, Mukesh Kumar, and I then discussed India’s showing in the Asian Age-Group Swimming Championship. I made a pitch for the Indians to train overseas rather than restrict themselves to camps in India with Indian coaches.
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Vikas Krishan (Photo courtesy: Indian Amateur Boxing Federation)
The sepia tint is strong but it does not take much for the image of an up and coming cricketer riding a bicycle to a newspaper office in Secunderabad to give the sports editors a copy of his photograph for use in the next morning’s edition comes through the sub-conscious. The montage that is playing on my mind is from the 70s when scoring a century or taking five wickets in the Hyderabad cricket league could enhance the chances of one’s photograph appearing in the newspaper.
This scene kept replaying in my mind’s eye when four Indian boxers – L Devendro Singh, Manoj Kumar, Jai Bhagwan and Vikas Krishan – won their pre-quarterfinals bouts in the AIBA World Championship in Baku, Azebaijan. And from the comfort of my home in Delhi, I got to hear Devendro and Manoj Kumar share their joy with boxing fans in India. This was thanks to the efforts of the Indian Amateur Boxing Federation in sending journalists an audio file.
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