International Master (Chess) Debasish Das and Indian women football coach Mohammad Shahid Jabbar were honoured with the Ashok Patnaik Memorial Sports Awards for the year 2010 in a  function at Saheed Sporting Club premises today.  Das and Jabbar received the awardeds as the best young sportsperson and best coach respectively.

Das became the third IM of the state this year, while Jabbar helped Indian women’s football team win the gold medal in the SAF Games. This year’s award for the best sports organisation went to city-based Utkal Karate School (UKS) for promoting weightlifting, powerlifting, arm-wrestling, shooting and fencing as well.

Former eminent footballers Prabhat Kumar Mohapatra and Dilip Sahoo handed over bouquets and citations to the awardees. Sports journalists Niranjan Reddy and sports writer Asish Kumar Mohapatra were felicitated on the occasion. The award was instituted in the year 2000 in the memory of the eminent sports journalist Dr Ashok Patnaik.
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PHOTO: Awardees and guests at the Ashok Patnaik Memorial Sports Awards function in Bhubaneswar on August 18, 2010.