21st National Athletics Championship for the Blind, New Delhi

The 21st edition of National Athletics Championship for the Blind, the largest sports event for the visually challenged in the country was held in New Delhi from 10 – 13 December 2018. The Meet was jointly organized by Indian Blind Sports Association (IBSA) and the Blind Relief Association, Delhi with USHA International as the title sponsor.

Participation  record number of 603 visually impaired athletes and officials representing 86 affiliate institutions from 19 states across the country participated in various track and field athletic events. 49 players including 3 female players participated in the chess competition.

The participants included budding as well as top national and international athletes. Divided into two age categories of Intermediate boys and girls (between 14 to 17 years) and Open men and women (not below 14 years) the participants competed separately according to their sight/vision classifications, namely, B-1(totally blind) and B-2 & B-3 (partially sighted) classes. The track events included 100, 200, 400, 800, 1500 and 5000m and relay races. Field events were long jump, shot put, javelin and discus throw. The only indoor event was chess.

State Participation

Seventeen states and two union territories participated in the Meet namely Gujarat, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Manipur, Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Orissa, Jharkhand, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Tripura, Andhra Pradesh and NCT of Delhi, Chandigarh (UT)

New states

Athletes from states like Tripura, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh participated in IBSA’s national meet for the first time. Also IBSA in collaboration with USHA International had been working to improve the participation of female athletes in blind sports and in this event saw participation of 205 female athletes.