Defence Minister Antony felicitates Armed Forces CWG medal winners

NEW DELHI - Defence Minister A K Antony on Friday felicitated Armed Forces sportsmen for their splendid performance in the XIXth Commonwealth Games that concluded on Thursday.

The Ministry of Defence rewarded the athletes from the Armed Forces by giving away Rs 12 lakh for each gold medal, Rs seven lakh for each silver medal and Rs five lakh for each bronze medal.

The Defence Minister, who gave away the cheques to the medallists here, congratulated them and also announced an out of turn promotion to each medal winner in the sporting extravaganza.

The armed forces personnel brought laurels to the country by winning ten gold, seven silver and eight bronze medals at the 2010 Games.

The armed forces provided support by contributing approximately 30 percent sportsmen to the Indian contingent in the men’s category for Aquatics, Archery, Athletics, Boxing, Cycling, Hockey, Rugby, Shooting, Weightlifting and Wrestling.

In numerical terms out of the 170 strong Indian Men’s contingent in the above sports, 60 athletes and officials were from the Indian Armed Forces.

These sportsmen have contributed 27 percent of the Gold medals to the nation’s overall tally, which indeed is a very major contribution and a moment of great pride for the armed forces.

On the occasion, Antony expressed hope that defence forces athletes would better their record in the fifth Military World Games to be held in Brazil next year, asserting that this will be an ideal preparation for 2012 London Olympics.

It has been reported that the Ministry of Defence has already allocated Rs 50 crore for 2012 London Olympics.

India, which made a record haul of 101 medals, including 38 Gold, 27 silver and 36 bronze, stood second in the medal tally behind Australia, which bagged 74 gold, 55 silver and 48 bronze medals.

The Commonwealth Games achievers from the armed forces are:

Shooting:

(i) Sub CK Choudhary - 01 Silver (Individual)ii) Sub Vijay Kumar - 01 Gold (Individual), 02 Gold (Team), 01 Silver (Individual)iii) Nb/Sub IH Khan - 01 Gold (Team)iv) Hav Gurpreet Singh - 02 Gold (Team), 01 Bronze (Individual)v) CPO Omkar Singh - 02 Gold (Individual), 01 Gold (Team), 01 Silver (Team)vi) PO Harpreet Singh - 01 Gold (Indl), 01 Gold (Team)

Weightlifting:

(i) Hav K Ravi Kumar - 01 Gold with CWG Record-69 Kg,ii) Hav Sukhen Dey - 01 Silver (Individual)CPO II CPR Sudhir Kumar - 01 Bronze (Individual)

Archery:

Sub Maj Tarundeep Rai - 01 Bronze (Team)ii) CH Jignes-BSC - 01 Silver (Team)

Wrestling:

(i) Hav Sunil Kumar - 01 Bronze (Individual)ii) Nb/Sub Manoj Kumar - 01 Silver (Individual)

Athletics:

(i) Hav Harminder Singh - 01 Bronze (Individual)ii) Hav Kashi Nath - 01 Bronze (Individual)

Boxing:

(i) CP Suranjoy Singh - 01 Gold/Silver (Individual) (ANI)