Valedictory ceremony held at Saudi Embassy in Delhi for Indian Haj delegation invited by Saudi King
New Delhi: A valedictory ceremony was held on Tuesday at the Saudi Embassy in New Delhi in honour of the thirty-member Indian Haj delegation invited by the King of Saudi Arabia to perform the holy pilgrimage this year as special royal guests.
The event was graced by the presence of the attaché of Islamic Affairs at the Embassy, Badr Nasir Alanazi, who personally interacted with the delegates, offering them warm wishes and prayers for a blessed pilgrimage. The ceremony marked a formal send-off for the honoured pilgrims ahead of their departure to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina.
Among the prominent figures in the delegation is Panakkad Sadiq Ali Shihab Thangal, President of the Indian Union Muslim League in Kerala. Representing Karnataka is Safwan Junaid, a resident of Pandeshwar in Mangaluru, known for his active involvement in social and religious activities.
Each year, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, through its Ministry of Religious Affairs, selects a group of individuals from across the globe as part of a special royal guest program for Haj. The King of Saudi Arabia, who also serves as the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, sponsors the entire pilgrimage, including travel, stay, and related arrangements. This year, over 1,300 individuals from various countries have been selected under this program, with 30 invitees representing India.
The Indian delegation is scheduled to depart for Jeddah from New Delhi on May 28, from where they will proceed to perform the Haj pilgrimage.
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
