A total of 148 athletes, including 20 new players across seven Olympic disciplines and six Paralympic Games, have been identified for support under the Lakshya Olympic Podium Scheme at a meeting of the Mission Olympic Cell of the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports here on Monday.
The MoC approved the lists in cycling, rowing, shooting, swimming, table tennis, weightlifting and wrestling as well as para sports (archery, athletics, badminton, shooting, swimming, table tennis). Archery, athletics, badminton, boxing, horse riding, fencing, golf, gymnastics, judo, rowing and tennis will be taken up at the next meeting later this month.
Although planning and preparations for the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris began long ago, the MOC meeting marks the formal start of the brief Olympic cycle. At least seven athletes have earned advancement from the Khelo India scheme and are among those joining the TOPS development group.
The recently reconstituted MoC, which has seven former athletes as new members, gave suggestions for preparation for the Paris Olympic Games so that India can build on the advantage of Tokyo 2020 where Indians won seven medals. TOPS is the flagship program of the Ministry to add to the support given under the annual calendar for training and competition.
The list of athletes for the TOPS core and development groups was prepared collectively by the TOPS team and the respective national sports federations. This involved thorough research, evaluation and estimation of athletes’ performance before being placed before the MOC for consideration.
It was also agreed that the MoC would meet every fortnight.
List of athletes who will be supported under TOPS:
cycling – Development Group: Esso Alben, Keithelkapam Jemash Singh, Latnjam Ronaldo Y Rojit Singh and E David Beckham (newly inducted).
sailing – Core Group: Vishnu Saravanan, Varun Thakkar, KC Ganapathi and Nethra Kumanan.
Shooting – Core Group: Divyansh Singh Panwar, Aishwarya Pratap Tomar, Saurabh Chaudhary, Abhishek Verma, Elavenil Valarivan, Anjum Moudgil, Manu Bhaker and Rahi Sarnobat Vijayveer Sidhu. Development Group: Yashvini Deswal and Chinki Yadav, Neeraj Kumar, Sartaj Singh Tiwana, Dhanush Shrikant, Shahu Tushar Mane, Hriday Hazarika, Rudrank Balasaheb Patil, Parth Makhija, Anish Bhanwala, Adarsh Singh, Udayveer Sidhu, Sarabjot Singh, Naveen, Shiv Narbjot Singh , Naveen, Shiva Kian Chenai, Lakshya Sheoran, Vivaan Kapoor, Gurjot Singh, N Gayatri, Sunidhi Chauhan, Nischal, Ayushi Poddar, Shreya Aggarwal, Shriyanka Sadrangi, Jeena Khitta, Abhindnya Ashok Patil, Tejaswini, Esha Singh, Rhythm Sangwan, Kirti Gupta , Manisha Darshana Rathore, Kartiki Singh Shaktiwat, Ariba Khan; Swapnil Suresh Kusale, Arjun Babuta, Anantjit Singh Naruka and Nisha Kanwar.
swimming – Core Group: Sajan Prakash and Srihari Nataraja. (Development group will be taken up in next meeting).
table tennis – Core Group: A Sharath Kamal, Sathiyan Gnanasekaran, Manika Batra and Sutirth Mukherjee, Harmeet Desai and Archana Kamat. Development Group: Manav Thakkar, Manush Shah and Ayika Mukherjee, Payas Jain, SFR Snehit, Swatiska Ghosh, Diya Chitale, Suhana Saini and Sreeja Akula.
Lifting – Core Group: Jeremy Lalrinnunga and Mirabai Chanu. Development Group: Achinta Shuli, Soumya Sunil Dalvi, Garuda Harshada Sharad, Kolli Varalakshmi Pavani Kumari, Mangakhya Boney, R Arokia Alish, Shankar Sargar, Gogoi Siddhant, Charu Pesi, Marcio Tario and Sorkhaibam Bindyarani Devi, N Tomchau Meitei, Neeraj Pradhan, Akanksha Pradhan, Vyavare, Shivani Yadav, Kajol Sargar, Jyoti Yadav, Komal Kohar, Sarika Shingare and Ajay Singh.
Wrestling – Core Group: Ravi Kumar, Bajrang Punia, Deepak Punia, Vinesh Phogat, Anshu Malik and Sonam Malil. Development Group: Sunil Kumar, Ravi, Ravinder, Gaurav Baliyan, Sajan, Sanju Devi, Aman, Aman, Rohit, Yash Tushir, Sandeep Singh, Deepak, Anirudh Kumar, Arjun Halkurki, Sandeep, Ashu, Honey Kumari, Sarita, Nisha, Bhateri and Bipasha.
para sports
Core Group: Archery: Harvinder Singh; Athletics: T Mariyappan, Sharad Kumar, Praveen Kumar, Sandeep Choudhary, Sumit Antil, Sunder Singh Gurjar, Amit Saroha, Devendra Jhajharia, Nishad Kumar, Navdeep and Yogesh Kathunia. Badminton: Suhas Yathiraj, Krishna Nagar, Pramod Bhagat, Manoj Sarkar, Tarun Dhillon and Parul Parmar. Shooting: Avani Lekhara, Manish Narwal and Singhraj Adana. Swimming: Suyash Jadhav; Table Tennis: Bhavna Patel.
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