Indian shuttler HS Prannoy on Tuesday slammed the Badminton Association of India (BAI) following their announcement for Arjuna award nominees.
His remarks came as BAI recommended Ace doubles pair Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty and singles star Sameer Verma for the Arjuna Award on Tuesday.
The shuttler has said that the players who have won nothing have been recommended, while the players who have medals to their credit have been snubbed.
HS Prannoy expressed his feelings on Twitter.
“#arjunaawards Same old story. Guy who has Medals in Cwg and Asian Championships not even recommended by Association. And guy who was not there on any of these major events recommended #waah #thiscountryisajoke,” he tweeted.
Criticised selection of Sameer
Prannoy questioned the selection criteria for the Award while criticising the selection of Sameer.
Prannoy had won a gold in the Mixed Team event at the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast and won a bronze in the singles category at the Asian Championships in Wuhan. His latest medal came this year at the 2020 Asia Team Championships in Manila where he won the bronze.
Meanwhile, Sameer won three titles and ascended to a career-high No. 11 in the world in 2018. His series of good performances earned him a place among the best-eight at the BWF World Tour Finals 2018, where he progressed to the semi-finals on debut.
Same old story
HS Prannoy was even snubbed last year after which he had lashed out at the organisation saying “If you ever want your name in the Awards list, make sure you have people who will get your name to the list. Performance is least considered in our country. Sad state of our county but can’t help it. Let go and just play until you can.”
Parupalli Kashyap supported Prannoy with a retweet saying “Never actually understood the system of applying for an Award. I hope this changes. Stay strong bro.”
The former national champion told Sportstar that he has better credentials as a player than the winners of the Arjuna award in badminton in the last two years.
“The BAI never really cares. Last year, at least my name was the before the committee and I was omitted in the last round and they told my performance towards the end of the year was not good.
“But this year my name wasn’t even recommended by the federation. If you look at my performance in the last two years I have better credentials than the names which were recommended by the federation for the award. It is really frustrating and disappointing, ” he said
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