AITA chalks out ambitious calendar

The AITA executive committee member Anil Khanna, told reporters that apart from the men’s events, the meeting finalised ten international tournaments for women to be held in different parts of the country till middle of next year.

According to the schedule, year 2001 will begin with the Gold Flake Open in Chennai (from January one) thereafter three ITF Futures events would be held in Guwahati (from Jan 8), Calcutta (from Jan 15) and Hyderabad (from Jan 22) and the Davis Cup from February five (venue yet to be decided).

The four Challenger series tournaments would be held at Mumbai (from Feb 12), Jaipur (from Feb 19), Lucknow (from Feb 26) and Calcutta (from March 5) followed by the three ITF Sattellites at Mumbai (from March 5), Pune (from March 12) and Nagpur (from March 19) and the Masters at Mumbai (from March 26).

Soon after the Davis Cup tie from April two for which the venue is yet to be decided, AITA will have three more ITF Sattellites in Kerala (from May 7), Bangalore (from May 14) an Delhi (from May 21) followed by the Masters at Chandigarh from May 28 onwards.

Khanna said that the women’s programme will start with the four ITF circuit ($5000) tournaments at Bangalore (from Feb 12), Hyderabad (from Feb 19), Mumbai (from Feb 26) and Delhi (from March 5) and the $10,000 prize money circuit tournaments at Chandigarh (from April 9) and Delhi (from April 16).

After the Federation Cup, starting on April 23, there would be three more ITF Circuit tournaments at Mumbai or Pune (from June 4), Indore (from June 11), Delhi (from June 18) and the Masters at Haryana from June 25.

The ITF Futures (men’s) to be held at Delhi from November 13 this year has now been shifted to Lucknow while the other two Futures would be held at Chandigarh (from Nov 6) and Mumbai (from Nov 20).

The Asia Cup for men and women, which will feature the top four teams in Asia, would be held in Delhi from December 18 while the two ITF circuit women’s tournaments ($ 10,000) to be held at Lucknow and Gwalior have been shifted to Gwalior (from Oct 16) and Delhi (from Oct 23).

AITA has launched a new scheme `School Tennis Initiative’ to get kids attracted towards game. Khanna said, “We have also started a new scheme in Delhi in which four or five-year-old children are provided mini tennis racquets and sponge balls free of cost.

“Nearly 3000 imported racquets from China have been distributed and about 10,000 children in Delhi have started playing mini tennis at a very early age. We hope to introduce this scheme in schools all over the country and expect to see atleast five to ten lakh children play the game in the next couple of years”, he added.

Khanna also proposed to set up an AITA trust which will look after all the stadium activities in the country.