"The badminton tournament originally scheduled to be on early December had been postponed in the absence of top ranked shuttlers," said AIG Rishab Dev Bhattarai, the chief of AFP Sports Club, during announcement of those events at the APF headquarters Sunday. [break]
Some of the top-rated players including Bikash Shrestha, Sajan Tamrakar, Dipesh Dhami and Indra Mahata are currently in Bangladesh for training while six other suttlers including two women are to visit India for training soon.
"We are also not in the state to hold the lawn tennis tournament later as the Sixth National Games are round the corner and we also need to conduct closed camp training for the games," Bhattarai said during the press conference. The Sixth National Games are to begin February 26 next year.
Both the badminton and lawn tennis tournaments are prestigious and carry the highest cash prizes. The total cash prize in badminton is Rs 765,000 this year -- Rs 100,000 more compared to the last edition.
Badminton features events in eight different categories including men´s and women´s singles, men´s and women´s doubles, mixed doubles, U-17 boys and girls, veteran doubles in two different categories, and inter-governmental service above 35 and 54 years, which features current and retired gazetted civil servants, police and army officers.
The event to be held under technical support of Nepal Badminton Association will be conducted as per Badminton World Federation (BWF) and Badminton Asian Confederation (BAC) rules.
Pashupati Paneru and Puja Shrestha are the defending champions of men´s and women´s singles respectively.
The winners and the runner up in men´s singles will win Rs 50,000 and 25,000 respectively and two semifinalists will receive 10,000 each. Similarly, four quarterfinalists will get Rs 5,000 each. Top two players in women´s singles will get Rs 40,000 and Rs 20,000 respectively while semifinalists will get 10,000 each.
The winning teams of men´s and women´s doubles will be awarded with Rs 50,000 and 40,000 and the runner-up teams will get Rs 30,000 and 20,000 respectively. All other events also carry handsome cash prizes not only to the winner and the runner-up players but also to semifinalists.
In coordination with the Nepal Badminton Association, organizers has fixed quota for shuttlers of different district on the basis of rankings of district players.
Similarly, lawn tennis will feature events in six different heads including men´s and women´s singles, men´s and women´s doubles and inter-governmental service and veteran´s in six different categories.
The event to be conducted under the rule of International Tennis Federation and Asian Tennis Federation will be conducted under technical support of Nepal Lawn Tennis Association.
Kumar Adhikari and Aslesha Lissanevitch are the holders of men´s and women´s singles titles.
The winners and runner-ups of men´s and women´s singles will bag a purse of Rs 50,000 and 25,000 respectively. The top two teams of men´s and women´s doubles will get Rs 30,000 and Rs 15,000 respectively. The other event also carries attractive cash prizes.
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