Indian shuttlers bagged the Asian Youth badminton championship titles in both Under-15 and Under-17 categories to wrap up the tournament with two gold and two bronze, their best ever performance at the competition, in Kudus, Indonesia, on Sunday.
Fourteen-year-old Siril Varma first registered a 21-11, 21-17 victory over local favourite Putra Gatja in the boys U-15 singles final before the top seeded boy's U-17 doubles combination of MR Arjun and Chirag Shetty defeated Thai combination of Mak Narongrit and Kantaphon Wangcharoen 21-16, 21-15 to clinch the title.
Bangalore's Daniel Farid (boys U-17 singles) and Krishna Prasad/Shreya Bose (U-15 mixed doubles) finished with a bronze medal each after losing their respective semi-finals on Saturday.
"I congratulate all the medal winners and I am extremely proud to say that India is fast emerging as a new power in world badminton in all age groups," said Badminton Association of India (BAI) president Akhilesh Das Gupta.
"The BAI has invested and is tirelessly working in junior and sub-junior programs for the last two years and now the results have started to come," he added.
The last time India had won a gold in this competition was when Prajakta Sawant and Raj Kumar won the mixed doubles gold in the 2007 Asian meet in Hanoi, Vietnam.
Image: The winning Indian team with their medals
Photograph: BAI
