Judo federation meet

Guwahati, Aug. 25: The Judo Federation of India has doubled the number of medal events in sub-junior and junior nationals just as it promised financial assistance to host associations.

“The decisions were taken at the annual general meeting of the federation, presided over by president of the association and former Union minister Jagdish Tytler here yesterday,” the president of the All-Assam Judo Association, R.C. Agarwal, said.

The sub-junior and junior events of the nationals would be held in two age-group categories — 10 to 12 years and 12 to 14 years in the sub-juniors, while 14 to 17 years and 17 to 20 years in the juniors. Each weight group would comprise seven weight groups.

The meeting released the fixture for the ensuing year with Goa bagging the right to host the next edition of the sub-junior nationals in October 2004. The junior nationals would be held at Warangal in Andhra Pradesh in November. Cuttack will host the 2003 senior nationals in December.

The India Cup international judo championship would be held in Uttar Pradesh.

The meeting doubled the royalty to be paid by the state associations for hosting the nationals, Agarwal said. However, a state would forfeit the royalty if it failed to host the championship assigned to it.

The state associations would now have to pay Rs 60,000 instead of Rs 30,000 as royalty to the national federation for sub-junior nationals. The royalty for the junior and senior nationals have been pegged at Rs 40,000 and Rs 20,000 respectively.

For zonal, Federation Cup and all-India invitational meets, the associations would have to pay Rs 10,000, while for international championships the amount would be Rs 60,000, Agarwal said.

The meeting also constituted a three-member ad hoc committee to replace the two judo associations in Orissa.

Tytler said the ad hoc committee, under Priyabrata Patnaik, would be awarded recognition on the basis of its performance as well as that of the Orissa judokas during the next year. Shyamsunder Lal and Biranchi Das were named members of the committee.

There were two parallel judo associations — the Orissa State Judo Association and the Orissa Amateur Judo Association. However, an observer deputed by the national federation had said the two associations had little contribution towards promoting the game in the state.