Manipur Wins The First Wrestling Gold in Khelo India Youth Games, 2019

K Loyangamba Singh comes out to be big name in this year’s version of Khelo India Youth Games, while talking about 3 years before from now he never had touched the wrestling mat. He grew up as an orphanage in Imphal, where he at a very young age showed his interest in Mukna which is a Manipur based traditional form of wrestling that is mostly played on mud or sand.

It was a moment when coach M Muhindro Singh spotted him and then brought to the Sports Authority of India (SAI) center based in Manipur and since then he showed a continuous progress. Recently, Loyangamba clinched gold in the category of by defeating Maharashtra’s Dnyaneshwar D Desai. While on the other hand Madhya Pradesh’s Ankit and Haryana’s Amandeep Singh won the bronze in U-17 Greco-Roman 51kg category wrestling. For Loyangamba, the gold was like adding a feather to his growing wings. After winning the title in U-15 category in 2018, he also won the title in Asian Championships held in 2018. Despite the great success in wrestling, the Manipur players remains quiet mostly due to their weak Hindi. Any question of media for his performance has a same answer always when he decently says “My Hindi weak.’ While on this gold win, coach Y Lukhoi Mangang of Imphal SAI centre comes to his help. He says “We came across him in Mukna and his talent was amazing, which has a similar style to Greco roman wrestling. He started his training just three years back and he has now made tremendous progress in the field,” Apart from the only medal in wrestling won by Manipur, Delhi overshadowed Haryana of the wrestling action on Day 1, winning five gold. While for Haryana, only Ravi in the 60kg category and Pradeep Kumar in the 55kg category won gold at the U-17 level and U-21 level. While Maharashtra’s Pravin Patil 55kg category in U-17 level and Punjab’s Honey Pal Singh in 67kg category in U-21 were the other gold-medal winners. In weightlifting, various national records were also broken with the Maharashtra winning three of the four gold in the competition.

By: Anuja Arora

Content: https://www.hindustantimes.com/other-sports/khelo-india-youth-games-2019-manipur-win-first-wrestling-gold-records-tumble-in-weightlifting/story-FZi4pSCUaDHh552cWE7IWJ.html