Haryana’s Anjali Kundu Devi became the fastest Indian to run 400 metres, beating Hima Das’ record this season by more than half a second. Devi clocked 51.53 seconds at the National Inter-State Athletics Meet. The 21-year-old is the only Indian woman yet to breach the 51.80 seconds mark to qualify for World Championships.
She previously won ‘Best Athlete Award’ in Bhubhaneshwar when she again crossed the mark. She will now appear for ‘confirmatory trials’ held by Athletics Federation of India.
AFI’s planning commission chairman Lalit Bhanot told The Indian Express,
“Anjali will have to attend a confirmatory trial before the World Championships. AFI has a policy of making athletes, who are not part of the national camp or have stayed away for whatever reason, attend these trials once they qualify for an international competition. Before the Asian Games, we had conducted similar confirmatory trials for athletes like Sandeep Kumari (discus throw) and Monica Chaudhary (1,500 metres) as they were not part of the national camp but had qualified. AFI has been asking Anjali to join the national camp for the past few months but she has given different reasons for not doing so. So we will have to see her performance at the confirmatory trials. Only after that will we decide on her selection for the World Championships”
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