SWIMMING IN TRIPURA

It is not clearly known when swimming was taken up as sports in Tripura but so far on the modern technique was first introduced in this State in 1960 with some students and sportsmen from Police Department constructing a bamboo structure in ‘Budhjung Pond’ under the guidance and active support of Ramesh Roy of Education Department. Accordingly, Annual aquatics competition in few styles such as 100-meter free style, 100-meter backstroke and 50-meter butterfly was started in the said ‘Budhjunj Pond’ in 1961. In the following year coaching camp in swimming was started along with other branches of sports in ‘Mahadev Bari Pond’ at Udaipur. In the same year Water Polo Exhibition was also initiated. The first Inter Sub-Division Swimming Competition took its initial step in 1962. Tripura swimmers were encouraged to participate in the longest swimming competition of Asia in the same year. Our girl swimmers attained unique success in their maiden appearance in All India Autumnal Aquatics Competition in 1962.

It is a mater of great pride that in 1963 Tripura first earned Gold Medals in 74 KM swimming, the longest in Asia, and in 19 KM swimming competition on the Ganges. After that memorable event Tripura never looked back, continued her voyage of success in long distance swimming, which is engraved in golden words in the aquatics history of India.

In 1966 boy swimmers of Tripura become second in Group Competition in Madras. In the succeeding year Tripura swimmers assumed third position participation in National Swimming Competition. 

In a bid to popularize this branch of sports in Tripura, Swimming competition was introduced for our budding swimmers on the occasion of the Children’s Day in 1968. 

The name Rati Ranjan Dhar is an inspiring name in Tripura as he attained spectacular success in long distance swimming. He became second in India-Cylone Palk Strait Swimming Competition held on March 28, 1969 covering a distance of about 25 miles in 17 hours and 58 minutes.

The Swimming Competitors from Tripura Secretariat have been taking part in All India Secretariat Staff Swimmers Meet since 1970 and have been continuously earning awards every year either as Champion or Runners up. 

The All India Rural Swimming Competition got off to a colorfulss start in 1973. Our state stepped into the competition in 1974 at National Swimming Pool in Delhi and made their presence felt in the National capital being champion in girl’s group and runners up in boy’s group.

The All India National Age Group Swimming Competition was introduced in 1974 and our state earned a rare distinction of winning nine Gold Medals creation record in the meet. In 1975 Second All India National Age Group Swimming Competition was held in New Delhi where five national records were built up by our swimmers. All of you will be elated to know that four, out of six, swimmers selected to International Meet at Seol were from Tripura. Their names were Ashish Chakranorty, Prabir Chakraborty, Badal Banik and Sentu Lal Sur whose trainer was SAI Coach Madhusudhan Dasgupta. But unfortunately the Government of India declined to give permission to their participation in the Seol Meet. 

The Present Committee:

President: Subal Rudra, MLA, Tripura. 
Vice-Presidents: Prabir Nag, Narayan Datta Gupta, Samarendra Roy.
General Secretary: Madhab Saha, MLA, Tripura.                          .
Joint Secretarys: Anish Ahamed, Chandan Dhar.  
Treasurer: Ranjit Chakraborty.     .

Affiliated Sub-divisions: Sadar, Sonamura, Udaipur, Amarpur, Sabroom, Khowai, Kailasahar.

Domestic Tournaments: State Meet Swimming Tournament for Senior Level, Sub Junior Level. 

Session Starts: In the month of March.