By IANS
New Delhi : India will stage its first grand prix tournament, carrying qualification points for the Beijing Olympics, at Hyderabad in April, Badminton Association of India (BAI) president V.K. Verma announced here Sunday.
“The International Badminton Federation (IBF) has granted India its first Grand Prix and it will be held in Hyderabad in April,” Verma told reporters on the sidelines of the first Pramod Mahajan All India Ranking Badminton tournament here.
The India Open, which carries the prize money of $130,000, was earlier scheduled to take place last year but was postponed due to serial blasts in Hyderabad.
Verma said the tournament will be the last chance for shuttlers to qualify for the Beijing Olympics.
“The Hyderabad Grand Prix will be the last qualification tournament for Olympics. The IBF has done a great favour to India by including it in the Olympic qualification list as earlier there were only 10 qualifying events but at our request they have revised it to 11,” Verma said.
“Apart from these, the IBF has also decided to grant the Gopichand Badminton Academy in Hyderabad the status of a world training centre. However, the formal approval will come after the IBF team’s inspection.”
He said the BAI had decided to adopt a ‘zero tolerance’ policy on shuttlers bugging their age in the junior category and had slammed a one-year ban on two junior players.
“If the BAI has any doubts over a player hiding his or her age, then they will be subjected to a medical examination and if found guilty they will be banned from badminton for one year,” Verma said.
“Already we have banned two junior players, K. Vikrant and Suranjan Bhobora of Assam,” he added.