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Banaras, November 28, 2014
Heralding a new era in Indian athletics with the potential to produce Olympic-level sprinters, GAIL (India) Limited – India’s no-1 natural gas company- in association with Spoment today launched their 16th leg of ‘GAIL-The Fastest Indian’ here. The talent hunt has successfully passed through fifteen cities including Chandigarh, Kochi, Bangalore, Goa & Delhi; and will be carrying this momentum to more cities across the country in the next couple of weeks.
This novel initiative is an attempt to find the next Milkha Singh for the country and is targeted at securing medals in athletics at Tokyo Olympics 2020. Legendary athlete ‘Padmashree’ Shri Milkha Singh, himself, is the principal mentor of this annual event. He will also provide his input and help in selecting and grooming potential winners.
Banaras witnessed the hunt hit the tracks on a very high energy note at the Sunbeam Suncity, school & hostel, Karsana, Bachaon. Following the welcome speech for the participants and dignitaries, the event saw a huge display of talent as enthusiastic students were eager to show off their athletic abilities with a few runners quite literally losing their shoes.
Nearly 300 students from different schools of the city and nearby areas participated in 100, 200 and 400 meter heats. The high spirited races were followed by the finals, which were held in the afternoon proceeding which the prize distribution commenced.
The event concluded with great aplomb as the participating parents and students applauded the initiative of the project and deemed it as the need of the hour as a majority of talent in India goes unrecognized due to lack of such competitive platforms.
GAIL-The Fastest Indian will identify, groom and develop champions who can win laurels for the country. Over the course of three months, GAIL-TFI talent hunt will conduct events across 19 cities reaching over 3,000 schools. Young boys and girls in the age group 12 to 14 years will get an opportunity to compete for the title of ‘GAIL-The Fastest Indian’. The Top 8 participants from across 19 cities in each category, based on their timings, shall qualify to take part in the National Finals on December 14, 2014 in Bengaluru.
The highlight of this initiative is that the winners of the finals will receive complete scholarship up to their post-graduation to focus on running and to motivate them. They would also receive specialized training from renowned national and international sports trainers.
Students willing to participate in GAIL-The Fastest Indian talent hunt can directly enroll themselves at www.thefastestindian.in and can get answers of all their queries by dialing at +91 9560121287.
The other partners who are making this dream possible include IFIM Business School (Academic partner) which is providing scholarships, Manipal Hospitals (Medical partner), sportskeeda.com (Digital media partner), Croma (Promotions partner), Fox Mandal (Knowledge partner), iCONGO(social justice partner), rightticket.in (Official partner), Yi (Out Reach partner) and Unibic (official cookie partner).
Results:
| 100 Meters – Boys | 100 Meters - Girls | ||||
| Position | Name | Time | Position | Name | Time |
| First | Ayush Singh | 12.31sec | First | Ragini Upadhayay | 15.15sec |
| Second | Chandramani | 12.42sec | Second | Muskan | 15.62sec |
| Third | Yashwant Kumar | 12.65sec | Third | Rimjhim Dubey | 15.72sec |
| 200 Meters – Boys | 200 Meters - Girls | ||||
| Position | Name | Time | Position | Name | Time |
| First | Umesh Kumar Yadav | 25.37sec | First | Ragini Upadhayay | 31.94sec |
| Second | Chandramani | 25.65sec | Second | Muskan | 34.00sec |
| Third | Ayush Singh | 25.84sec | Third | Muskan Murya | 34.37sec |
| 400 Meters – Boys | 400 Meters - Girls | ||||
| Position | Name | Time | Position | Name | Time |
| First | Umesh Kumar Yadav | 56.34sec | First | Muskan Murya | 1.16.72min |
| Second | Shivanak | 1.01.7min | Second | Shivangi Singh | 1.19.12min |
| Third | Chandan Kumar | 1.02.37min | Third | Prachita Jain | 1.23.32min |
Event Schedule
| Sl No | City | Date | Sl No | City | Date |
| 1 | Chandigarh | 10-Oct-14 | 11 | Bangalore | 11-Nov-14 |
| 2 | Bhopal | 13-Oct-14 | 12 | Hyderabad | 17-Nov-14 |
| 3 | Delhi | 14-Oct-14 | 13 | Mumbai | 21-Nov-14 |
| 4 | Ahmedabad | 16-Oct-14 | 14 | Ranchi | 21-Nov-14 |
| 5 | Jaipur | 17-Oct-14 | 15 | Patna | 25-Nov-14 |
| 6 | Ludhiana | 30-Oct-14 | 16 | Lucknow | 25-Nov-14 |
| 7 | Goa | 31-Oct-14 | 17 | Banaras | 28-Nov-14 |
| 8 | Chennai | TBA | 18 | Bhubaneswar | 29-Nov-14 |
| 9 | Rudrapur | 4-Nov-14 | 19 | Guwahati | 4-Dec-14 |
| 10 | Kochi | 7-Nov-14 | 20 | FINALS -Bangalore | Likely Date Dec 14th |
