Haryana grab 106 medals to become overall champions at National Paralympic Athletics

Chennai, Feb 20 (PTI) Haryana reigned supreme at the 23rd National Paralympic Athletics Championship, clinching a staggering 106 medals, including 49 gold here on Thursday.

With an additional 32 silver and 25 bronze, they topped the medals tally to emerge overall champions.

Hosts Tamil Nadu finished second with 17 gold, 18 silver, and 12 bronze, while Uttar Pradesh secured the third place with 14 gold, 17 silver, and 11 bronze. Rajasthan and Maharashtra rounded off the top five in the three-day event.

On the final day's action, Haryana made a clean sweep in the men’s discus throw F37 event, where Bhavishay claimed gold with a throw of 44.27m, narrowly beating his state mate Haney, who took silver with an effort of 44.13m. Ankit, also from Haryana, secured bronze.

In the men's discus throw F51 event, Haryana's Dharambir clinched gold with a best attempt of 10.91m, while Uttar Pradesh's Ram Ratan Singh and Tamil Nadu's Alexander Mani settled for silver and bronze, respectively.

In the men's discus throw F62/F64 category, Pradeep Kumar from SSCB clinched gold with a throw of 44.00m, while Rakesh of SSCB won the F42/F43/F44 event with 49.52m effort.

Haryana's Devender Kumar secured silver with 49.01m, followed by Shubham Dhull's bronze who produced 46.23m effort.

Haryana's Ekta Bhyan maintained her supremacy in the club throw F32/F51 event, winning gold with a distance of 20.14m, while Rajasthan's Durga Gahlot took silver and Haryana's Geeta Rani secured bronze.

In the women's 200m T35/T36/T37 final, Delhi's Priyanka Sharma sprinted to gold in 38.11 seconds, with Karnataka's Harshita Tater and Chandigarh's Babanpreet Kaur securing silver and bronze, respectively.

The endurance events saw Rajasthan's Rajesh Yadav win the men's 5000m T13 category in 16:26.75s, while Karnataka's Sharath MS claimed the T12 title in 15:50.49s.

The championship witnessed participation from 1,476 para-athletes across 30 states and Union Territories, competing in 155 events. PTI TAP SSC SSC