Photo caption: Himanshu Gokani (seated centre), Hon Secretary of JVPG Club, Chetan Desai (3rd left) brother of Anirudh Desai, and other members of the organising committee are seen during the press conference to announce details of the AITA Ranking Rs 22 lakh prize-money JVPG Anirudh Desai All-India Open Tennis Tournament 2018.
Mumbai, January 31:
The cream of Indian men's and women's players will be vying for the top honours in the AITA Ranking Rs 22 lakh prize-money JVPG Anirudh Desai All-India Open Tennis Tournament 2018, to played at the Juhu Vile Parle Gymkhana’s floodlit tennis courts from February 5 to 11, 2018. This is the richest prize-money AITA Ranking Tournament in the history of Indian lawn tennis organised by a private club in the country.
This tournament is being conducted to commemorate the memory of the late Anirudh Desai, a club member and tennis aficionado and his family is the title sponsor to the event.
Events will be conducted in men's singles, men's doubles, women's singles, women's doubles and mixed doubles.
This was announced by Hon Secretary of JVPG Club, Himanshu Gokani, at a press conference at the Club premises on Wednesday. “Juhu Vile Parle Gymkhana Club is living up to their reputation of promoting sports in all disciplines, including tennis. This year we have increased the total prize purse to make it one of the richest AITA tournaments and decided to offer equal amount of prize money to the men and women winners,” said Gokani.
The men's draw will be headed by defending champion and Indian No. 7 ranked, Siddharth Rawat of Uttar Pradesh followed Pune's 24-year-old Arjun Kadhe, who is ranked 10, as second seed. Current national champion Dalwinder Singh and runner-up Suraj R. Prabodh are also included in the main draw.
In the woman singles, Mahak Jain from Madhya Pradesh, who is ranked seventh, is the top seed, as defending champion Riya Bhatia, who is ranked fifth has withdrawn from the championship. The organizers said they are not aware of the reason why Riya has pulled out of the tournament.
The 16-year-old Mahak has represented India in the US Open Junior Tennis Championship 2017, The Junior Championship 2017, Wimbledon and Australian Open 2017 Junior.
The men and women champions will receive a handsome prize of Rs 2 lakh each and the runner-up will get Rs 1 lakh each. Prize money in the singles will be offered from the first round itself, with the first round losers also gaining Rs 12,000 each. Prize money will also be awarded to the qualifying losers.
This is the only tournament in the country to hold a mixed doubles event, along with doubles competitions for men and women, all three events offering a winner’s purse of Rs 50,000 each. A ‘Fastest Serve’ competition will be held during the course of the tournament.
Following are the top players participating:
Men’s top 8: 1. Sidharth Rawat (UP – rank 7), 2. Arjun Kadhe (Mah - rank 11), 3. Suraj R. Prabodh (KA - rank 13), 4. Dalwinder Singh (PB - rank 15), 5. Manish Sureshkumar (TN - rank 17), 6. Kunal Anand (DL - rank 18), 7. Mohit Mayur Jayaprakash (TN - rank 19), 8. Hardeep Singh Sandhu (PB - rank 20).
Women’s top 8: 1. Mahak Jain (MP - rank 7), 2. Sai Samhitha (TN - rank 9), 3. Rishika Sunkara (DL - rank 13), 4. Nithyaraj Baburaj (TN - rank 14), 5. Eetee Maheta (GJ - rank 15), 6. Humera Shaikh (TS - rank 16), 7. Nandani Sharma (PB - rank 17), 8. Ramya Natrajan (TN - rank 18).
Prize Money break-up:
Men’s & Women’s: Winner Rs 2,00,000; Runner-up Rs 1,00,000; losing semi-finalists Rs 50,000 each; losing quarter-finalists Rs 25,000 each; losing pre-quarter-finalists Rs 15,000 each; losing 1st round players Rs 12,000 each.
Doubles (3 categories): Winners Rs 50,000; Runners-up Rs 30,000; losing semi-finalists Rs 20,000 each; losing quarter-finalists Rs 15,000 each.