Guwahati: There was no stopping the Indian juggernaut in the 12th South Asian Games with the country’s swimmers, wrestlers and weightlifters continuing their demolition of competition to fetch a bulk of gold medals and complete a second successive day of supremacy here.
India stood heads and shoulders above competition to top the medals tally with a count of 43, which included 28 gold, 12 silver and three bronze medals. The second spot continued to be held by Sri Lanka with 38 medals (8 gold, 17 silver, 13 bronze).
The bulk of medals on the day came through the swimmers, who scooped 10 in all — including four gold, five silver and one bronze.
The wrestlers added four gold and a silver, while the weightlifters snared three gold medals.
As many as five Games record were created out of the seven events on the day with the Indians accounting for three of them, including Sejwal’s.
However, India suffered a reverse as well with ace swimmer Veerdhawal Khade losing the men’s 50m freestyle gold to Sri Lankan teenager Matthew Abeysinghe, who grabbed his third medal in the Games, the most by any swimmer so far.
Abeysinghe won in a Games record time of of 23:33 to emerge as the fastest swimmer of the Games, eclipsing Khade’s 2010 Dhaka edition mark of 23.75 secs. Khade also bettered his own Dhaka mark with an effort of 23.54 secs but had to be content with the silver.
On the other hand, Sandeep Sejwal, after his 200m breaststroke gold, added another yellow metal in the 100m breastroke in a new Games record time of 1:03.14. Another Indian, Puneet Rana took the silver in 1:03.80 while Kiran Jasinghe of Sri Lanka got the bronze.
In the men’s 1,500m freestyle, Kerala swimmer Sajan Prakash won his first international gold in 15:55.30 ahead of compatriot Saurabh Sangvekar (16:13.2) and third-placed Mohammed Mahfizur Rahman of Bangladesh (17:12.0).
In the women’s 400m individual medley, India also finished one-two with Sayani Ghosh taking the gold in 05:14.51 while Shraddha Sudhir bagged the silver in 05:23.32, ahead of Sri Lanka’s J. Silva (05:44.20).
M. Arvind gave India the fourth gold by winning the men’s 200m backstroke event.
The wrestlers continued to annihilate the competition with Amit Dhankar (70kg), Mamta (53kg), Manju Kumari (58kg) and Pradeep (61kg) picking up gold medals in their respective events on the day.
Weightlifters Saraswati Rout (women’s 58 kg), Sambo Lapung (men’s 69 kg) and Ajay Singh (men’s 77 kg) also impressed winning a gold each to take India’s medal tally (in weightlifting) to six gold out of eight on offer in two days. In Shillong, India clinched two gold medals in the men’s and women’s table tennis team events with wins over Sri Lanka and Pakistan.
Also continuing their fine show were the cyclists, who added a gold, a silver and a bronze medal.
Lidiyamol Sunny and Tongbram Manorama Devi bagged a gold and silver in the women’s 40km criterium event.
The archers remained on course to grab all the 10 gold medals on offer by storming into the finals of the recurve and compound team and mixed pair events. India’s women shuttlers, led by P.V. Sindhu, began their campaign with a 3-0 win over Nepal. Meanwhile in men’s event, India beat Afghanistan 3-0.
The Indian women’s hockey team began their campaign with a 24-0 mauling of Nepal in a round robin league match while the men’s team defeated Bangladesh 4-1.
