Post News Network
Bhubaneswar, July 13: Orissa athletes continued their splendid show by winning three more medals including a gold medal on the concluding day of the 55th National Inter-State Athletic Championships at Chennai, Monday.
Purnima Hembram won gold in the women’s heptathlon event, while sprinters Amiya Kumar Mallick and Dutee Chand won silver and bronze medals in the men’s and women’s 100 metres races.
Dominating the show on both the days of the heptathlon event, Purnima scored 5,444 points to take the top honours. The Joseph twins of Kerala, Liksy and Niksy won the silver and bronze medal with 5,320 and 5,239 points respectively. With the top place finish, Purnima took sweet revenge against Liksy, who had beaten her in the recently-concluded Asian Championship in China.
Sprinter Amiya got back into form after losing form for nearly a year. He clocked 10.58 seconds to secure the second place in the men’s 100 metres. Dharmbir Singh of Haryana (10.51seconds) won the gold, while Vikas Gulia of Delhi (10.65 seconds) bagged the bronze medal.
However Dutee’s bad form continued to plague her and she finished third in the women’s 100 metres with a time of 12.10 seconds. M Jyothi (11.87 seconds) of Karnataka and Merlin K Joseph (12.08 seconds) of Gujarat bagged the gold and silver respectively.
It turned out to be a bad day for Srabani Nanda who was disqualified in the 100 metres due to technical foul during the heats earlier in the day.
Orissa ended the event with a total of six medals including three gold, two silver and one bronze. With their gold winning feats, Srabani and Purnima have brightened their chances for the World Athletic Championship at Beijing in August.
However, the star of the day was shot putter Inderjeet Singh of Haryana who grabbed the spotlight by clinching gold with a new meet record on the concluding day. Inderjeet heaved the iron ball to 20.44m to easily finish on top and win his eighth gold medal on the trot in six months. He achieved the distance on his fifth throw.
Starting with the gold in National Games in February, Inderjeet had won the Federation Cup title in Mangalore in May. After winning the Asian Championship in China, the shot-putter clinched a hat-trick of title wins in the three Grand Prix Series – in Bangkok, Panthumthani and Chanthaburi – in Thailand last month.
Inderjeet then finished on top in the World University Games shot put event earlier this month to become the first Indian ever to win a gold in athletics in the World Universiade.