Women's 400m relay team for Olympics

Indian women's 4 x 400m relay team has finally been included in the list of Beijing Olympics qualifiers after the International Amateur Athletics Federation (IAAF) rectified its "mistake", Athletics Federation of India said on Wednesday.

India were earlier excluded from IAAF's list of top 16 teams, who will contest in Beijing, as it had not considered Asian Grand Prix series held on June 23, 26 and 30 as Olympic qualifying events. India had won gold with an impressive timing of 3:28.29 in the second event in Korat, Thailand last month.

The team comprised Satti Geetha, Chitra, M R Poovamma and Mandeep Kaur.

After taking into account the effort in Korat, the Indian quartet have an average timing of 3:30.84 which had placed them in the 14th spot above Italy, instead of outside top 20 if the Asian Grand Prix series were not considered.

The Indian team had finished seventh in the Athens Olympics in 2004 and since then team was on the winning spree on the continental level with title at Asian Games 2006, Asian Championships 2007 and silver in Commonwealth Games 2006.

"In the latest IAAF list, India are in the 14th place. Since there are no more qualifying events left for the Beijing Olympics, Indian team has qualified for the mega event," an AFI release said.

"We have also received a communication in this regard from the IAAF," AFI director M L Dogra said.

The top 16 teams as on July 16 will compete in the relay event in Beijing.