Nationalised Services Badminton Awards - a glittering show
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Pubudu Wanigasekera(left) of Lake House who won the Women’s
Title Badminton Title for 2007 receiving award from Mrs. Leisha
de Silva Chandrasena, Chairperson of Sri Lanka Telecom. -
Pictures by Saman Sri Wedage
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BADMINTON: Dilan Yasantha of Ceylon Petroleum Corporation carried
away the coveted men’s singles ‘A’ division championship title conducted
by the Nationalised Services Badminton Association of Sri Lanka (NSBA)
for 2008 while Wijayalakshmi G. Liyanage of Bank of Ceylon took the
corresponding women’s title at a glittering awards ceremony held at the
Grand Ballroom of the Galadari Hotel, Colombo recently.
The awards ceremony which also included the 2007 championship, which
was held under the patronage of Mrs. Leisha de Silva Chandrasena,
Chairperson of Sri Lanka Telecom who was the chief guest, also saw
Chamila Kurupanawela of the Sri Lanka Ports Authority and Pubudu
Wanigasekera of the Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Ltd., Lake House
respectively carry away the ‘A’ division titles for 2007.
The ceremony was a riot of colour with shuttlers from the
Nationalised Services warming up to this annual event which saw the
cream of the sport at that level flock together in seeing their sweat
and toil in the badminton court reach its culmination in savouring their
awards in what was their big day.
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Men’s champion of 2007 Chamila Kurupanawela on left and
Wijelakshmi G. Liyanage - the 2008 women’s champion. |
The message held out to these sportsmen and women from the President
of the NSBA Rohan Seneviratne who addressed the gathering, was that
their ‘biggest and most anticipated event saw the skills and efforts and
enthusiasm of the players find recognition for the years 2007 and 2008.
He said that it was noteworthy that this year the NSBA had been able
to work very productively to complete its calendar of events with a lot
of success and thus achieve their objectives in full.
The calendar year included four tournaments for its affiliated member
clubs and the All Island Open Badminton Championship had conspicuously
been a national ranking open tournament for badminton players. More than
800 entries were received for the tournament which was conducted on par
with any international tournament in the region.
The participation for the four tournaments conducted on behalf of
shuttlers of NSBA sector viz. Novices, League, Open and Knock-Out had
been encouraging and quite a few shuttlers were seen in action.
He thanked the NSBA Executive Committee for their support throughout
in making the event a success.
The guest of honour was Jayantha Dharmadasa - Managing Director,
Nawaloka Group of Companies, Priyantha Kariyapperuma - Director General
Telecommunication Regulatory Commission and Leel Karunaratne - Director
Finance of Brantel Lanka (Pvt.) Ltd.
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