NEW DELHI, June 26: Top Indian shuttlers, including world champion PV Sindhu, will be able to hit the courts from July 1 if the Telangana government allows the Badminton Association of India (BAI) to organise a national camp in Hyderabad.
While a bunch of Indian players have started practising at the Prakash Padukone Badminton Academy (PPBA) in Bengaluru after the Sports Authority of India (SAI) laid down rules for resumption of training late last month, the elite players in Hyderabad had no such luck.
With COVID-19 cases surging in Hyderabad, the Telangana government, as a precautionary measure, extended the lockdown till June 30 but it meant the resumption of the sport got further delayed for the top players in the state.
�The pandemic has put a break on our training but after weighing the situation, we have decided to start the training camps in Hyderabad from July 1, subject to state government�s permission and approval,� BAI secretary Ajay Singhania told PTI. In March, the BAI had postponed the Senior National Championships, scheduled in Lucknow between April 27 to May 3 in wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and it has now decided not to resume the domestic circuit till September.
�BAI had a discussion with all state secretaries on the status of resuming the domestic tournaments and after consultations it was decided that domestic tournaments will not resume till September,� Singhania said.
�The pandemic situation will be further accessed and reviewed in September.�
In February, BAI had announced the introduction of a multi-level domestic tournament structure, which will have a combined prize money of approximately Rs 2 crore, to replace the senior ranking tournaments in the country. � PTI
