Indian lifts public sector carrom title

Bangalore, Apr 17 (UNI) Indian lifted the men's team title by outclassing Indian Oil Corporation Ltd (IOCL) 3-0 in the All India Public Sector Carrom Tournament, held at KSBA hall here today.

In the first singles, former World Cup winner M Nataraj beat K Ramesh Babu 25-18, 25-8, while current World Champion R M Shankara gave the airlines team a decisive lead by defeating current World Cup winner Yogesh Pardeshi 25-24, 25-24 in a closely fought second game.

In the doubles, Arjuna awardee and former World Champion A Maria Irudayam and his partner E Magimai Raj completed the sweep for Indian (Formerly Indian Airlines), overcoming P Simon Isaac and A Kannan 23-25, 25-1, 25-13.

Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) finished third, beating hosts Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd (ONGC) 2-1 in the losers' final.

In the individual events that commenced today, a major upset was caused when unheralded R Babu of BSNL defeated Shankara 21-25, 25-20, 25-6.

In the women's doubles event, P Nirmala/Apoorva of LIC, Banu Das/ Bharti Medhi of BSNL, Bharati Narayan/D Adhya of LIC and Rashmi Kumari/Anita Naik also from LIC made it to the semifinals.

UNI