The Oxenford Studios around 20ks outside Gold Coast has seen many reel life dreams scripted and executed, On April 8, India scripted a new chapter in women’s table tennis by winning the women’s team competition at the Commonwealth Games. (CWG live updates)
Manika Batra was in superb form, registering two singles victories as India clinched an unlikely gold by beating a strong Singapore side 3-1 in the final at the Commonwealth Games here on Sunday.
Their peers have been dismissed by many a foreign experts as not even table tennis players because of their lack of fitness and body shapes that not at all athletic in nature.
But this current lot of women table tennis players in the country is hell-bent on changing that image and Manika Batra is a fine example of that new found resolve and image of Indian table tennis players.
Manika, ranked 58th in the world, gave India the lead by winning the first singles match against a player ranked 4th in the World and though Madhurika Patkar lost the second singels, she teamed up with Mouma Das to make it 2-1 for India.
In the first game in first match againt World No 4 Feng Tianwei, Manika Batra mixed solid defense blocks with aggression strokes and good serve to come back from a 1-2 deficit to win 11-7, 8-11, 7-11, 11-9, 11-7 and give India the lead.
India Tribune, as an English weekly newspaper, was launched in 1977 in Chicago by its publisher Prashant Shah with a lofty ideal to serve the Asian Indian community in the USA. Over the years, it has grown with all vigor, and now it is being published in three editions – Chicago, New York and Atlanta. India Tribune, a journal of its kind for the family in the USA, has been a household name for many Indians for over three decades with each issue commanding a readership of over 125,000.
