Dani, Karishma qualify for main draw

Mumbai: Former junior national boys champion Harsheel Dani, current champion Aditya Joshi and junior girl Karishma Wadkar qualified for the main draw of the 6th Tata Open India International Challenge badminton tournament today.

2012 junior national champion Dani upset sixth seed Prem Singh Chauhan in the first qualifying round before getting past experienced rival Rohan Castelino 21-13 22-20 in the men's singles at the Cricket Club of India here.

Karishma, under 17 junior national runner-up, ousted R Santoshi Hasini 21-18 21-15 to make it to the women's singles main draw of an international tournament for the first time.

Also joining them in the main draw was Joshi who surged past Srujan Nandaluri 21-12, 21-18.

Dani was in complete control throughout the 30-minute men's tie against Castelino and would face seventh seed Shubhankar Dey in the first round tomorrow.

In the women's singles, Karishma faced another junior Harini and had no trouble in overcoming her rival. She will meet compatriot Jacqueline Rose Kunnath in the opening round.

Qualifying Results: (All Indians unless stated otherwise):

Men's Singles (Round 1): Ketan Chahal bt C M Shashidhar 21-8 21-13; Siddharath Thakur bt Ratnajit Tamang, NEP, 21-9 21-17; Deepak Khatri bt Suraj Rayadurga 21-16 21-19; Manish Gupta bt

Bikash Shrestha, NEP, 21-11 21-17; Gaurav Venkat bt K Dilshad 21-18 21-10; Nigel D'Sa bt Dipesh Dhami, NEP, 21-6 21-10; Harsheel Dani bt Prem Singh Chouhan 21-11 21-7; Rohan Castelino bt Sajan Krishna Tamrakar, NEP, 21-3 21-11; Aditya Joshi bt Lewis Wang, AUS, 21-15 21-13.

Srujan Nandaluri w/o S Balu Mahendra; Ashish Sharma bt A Sachin Premashan Dias, SRI, 21-13 21-18; Yi-Hsiang Yang, TPE, bt B Kiran Kumar 21-15 21-14; DGB Tharindu Dullewa, SRI, bt Vipul Saini 21-15 21-19; Velavan Vasudevan bt Arsalan Naqvi 9-21 21-19 21-16; Abhinav Manota bt Nikhar Garg, BRN, 21-4 21-8; Talar Laa bt Arun Kumar Ashok Kumar 21-15 12-21 21-13.
Round 2: Dani bt Castelino 21-13 22-20; Aditya Joshi bt Srujan Nandaluri 21-12 21-18.

Women's singles (Round 1): Siri Chandana Oleti bt Rini Tandel 18-21 21-11 21-13; Karishma Wadkar bt R Santoshi Hasini 21-18 21-15; Sanskriti Chhabra bt Jyoti Nashier 21-10 21-11.