Rituparna Das is on a comeback trail but injuries to her left ankle and right wrist (she underwent a surgery) have not completely healed. However, the 27-year-old — a former National women’s singles champion in 2017 — is hopeful of sorting things out and getting ready for the challenges ahead.
In fact, 2017 was the best year for Rituparna as she also attained a career-high world ranking of 44. That, however, has now slipped to 219 and she knows there are no easy solutions.
“I am just trying to get back [to full fitness]. I will play in the International Challenge in Azerbaijan and Sri Lanka in February 2024,” said Rituparna, after a facile 21-11, 21-11 win over Chitwan Khatri of Haryana in the 85th senior National badminton championships here on Wednesday. She will play the top seed Aakarshi Kashyap of Chhattisgarh in the second round.
Petroleum’s B. Sai Praneeth, the 2019 World championships bronze medallist, gave a walkover to Saahas Kumar Potiki Reddi of Telangana in the men’s singles first round.
Later, Tamil Nadu’s K. Sathish Kumar, singles champion in the recently concluded Odisha Masters, scripted a confident 21-17, 21-11 win over Harshit Thakur of Chhattisgarh to enter the second round. All the top players have been given a bye in the first round.
The results (first round): Men: Saahas Kumar Potiki Reddi (TS) w/o B. Sai Praneeth (Pet); K. Sathish Kumar (TN) bt Harshit Thakur (Cha) 21-17, 21-11; Chirag Sen (Rlys) bt S. Sankar Muthusamy (TN) 9-8 (retd.); T. Sidarth (TN) bt Dhruv Prasad (Chan) 21-13, 23-21; Dhruv Rawat (Utr) bt Siddharth Pratap Singh (Rlys) 21-19, 21-19; Ayush Shetty (Kar) bt Adheep Gupta (Guj) 22-20,2 1-17; K. Tarun Reddy (TS) bt Raghav Dogra (J&K) 21-15, 21-9; Chirag Seth (UP) bt Venkata Sai (AP) 321-15, 21-17; Lokesh Reddy (AP) bt Tukum Laa (AR) 21-9, 21-17; Aditya Joshi (Pet) bt Saurav Kapoor (RBI) 21-16, 3-3 (retd.).
Women: Rituparna Das (Pet) bt Chitwan Khatri (Har) 21-11, 21-11; Anura Prabhudesai (Rlys) bt Krishika Mahajan (J&K) 21-15, 21-14; L. Sreshta Reddy (TS) bt Lalrinhlui (Miz) 21-4, 21-7; Rutvi Baloni (Guj) bt Namita Pathania (CAG) 18-21, 27-25, 21-7; Jahnavi Nammi (AP) bt P. Srija (Bih) 21-6, 21-15; Pranika Holkar (MP) bt Harshitaa Rout (Odi) 21-18, 21-14; Tanvi Sharma (PNB) bt Tanya Hemanth (AAI) 21-16, 21-11; Malvika Bansod (RBI) bt Mayuri Barman (Asm) 21-6, 21-16.
