India completed a clean sweep in Kabaddi, with both the boys’ and girls’ teams winning gold at the ongoing Asian Youth Games 2025 in Manama, Bahrain.
Both Indian sides defeated Iran in their respective finals, though in contrasting fashion. The boys’ team faced a tough fight before edging past Iran 35-32, while the girls’ team produced a dominating performance to crush Iran 75-21.
The Indian girls’ team had topped the group stage, remaining unbeaten with victories over Bangladesh (46-18), Thailand (70-23), Sri Lanka (73-10) and Iran (59-26). The top two teams from the round-robin stage advanced to the final.
The boys’ team too maintained an unbeaten record, posting wins against Bangladesh (83-19), Sri Lanka (89-16), Pakistan (81-26), Iran (46-29), hosts Bahrain (84-40) and Thailand (85-30) before securing gold.
India’s medal tally received further boosts from taekwondo and athletics. In taekwondo, Debasish Das reached the semi-finals of the boys’ individual recognised poomsae event, defeating Bangladesh’s Tahib Hossan Osman and Mongolia’s Amar Amgalan before losing to China’s Gao Zixuan to settle for bronze. In the mixed pair recognised poomsae, Yashwini Singh and Shivanshu Patel also won bronze after losing to Thailand in the semi-finals.
In athletics, Ranjana Yadav opened India’s account with a silver in the girls’ 5000m walk, clocking 24:25.88s behind China’s Liu Shiyi (24:15.27s). Riya Rathore finished fourth in the same event. Jasmine Kaur claimed bronze in the girls’ shot put with a 14.86m throw, while Shourya Ambure earned silver in the girls’ 100m hurdles with a personal best of 13.73s.
With the Kabaddi triumphs, India’s tally at the Games rose to 10 medals — two gold, three silver and five bronze.
A 222-member Indian contingent is competing at the continental event, which concludes on October 31.
(With inputs from ANI)