Chennai, Jan 19 (IANS): Tamil Nadu’s R Pooja Arthi and Madhya Pradesh’s Tavneet Singh Mundra have been given top billing in the girls’ and boys’ sections of the squash competition at the Khelo India Youth Games (KIYG).

Squash will be making its debut in the sixth edition of the national-level KIYG to be held from January 19 to 31 in Chennai, Coimbatore, Tiruchi and Madurai, with over 6,000 under-19 school-going sportspersons from across India competing in 26 different disciplines.

The squash event will be conducted at the Indian Squash & Triathlon Academy in Chennai between January 20 and 24 and comprises boys’ and girls’ individual and team events.

The individual draw is based on the players’ SRFI national rankings, while eight states will feature in the team event in each category.

Pooja Arthi, runner-up at the 2023 National Games, was given pride of place as she is currently No 4 among women and No 2 among U-19 girls in India.

Maharashtra’s Nirupama Dubey, who is ranked third among U-19 girls in the country, is the second seed, while the competitive field also includes leading juniors Reiva Nimbalkar (Maharashtra), Unnati Tripathi (UP) and Dhritih Kandpal (Gujarat), among others.

Aryan Pratap Singh of Uttar Pradesh is the second seed in the boys’ field that also features the reigning National U-17 champion Arihant KS (TN) and Sandhesh PR (TN), who won the U-19 crown at the premier CCI-Western India Slam in Mumbai last month.

N Ramachandran, Patron, the Squash Rackets Federation of India, expressed delight at the sport’s inclusion in the KIYG, which will help further broadbase the sport.

“I’d like to thank the Sports Development Authority of Tamil Nadu for their steadfast support that has helped in the growth and development of squash in Tamil Nadu and India and we look forward to hosting a successful event,” Ramachandran said.