Inter-IIT Sports Meet '98

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The 34th Inter-IIT was held from 14th Dec to 19th Dec 1998 in IIT Bombay. A record number of participants (544) took part in this sports meet. They represented all the IIT's including IIT Gauhati, which fielded 44 athletes.

The Aquatics championships were as usual held in the month of October as it is too cold to conduct the Swimming and Water-Polo matches in December. Here, in both, Swimming as well as Water-Polo, IIT Bombay retained the Aquatics Title winning all but two swimming events and setting a record in as many as 12 of the events at stake! The star attractions of the Aquatic meet were the Kopikare brothers and a newcomer from IIT Kharagpur- Debashis Sen. The three among them accounted for almost all the medals at stake with Milind Kopikare winning the Individual Championship award.

The Inter-IIT meet was inaugurated on the December 14th by Padmavibhusan Prof. M.G.K. Menon. All the contingents did the traditional march-past with last years winners of the General Championship, Kharagpur leading the other teams. IIT Gauhati won the Trophy for the Best March Past. 15th morning saw the events beginning in full earnest with the finest athletes of each team vying for the top honours.   The Athletics events saw a fine display by IIT Kanpur's Akshay Sharma, a virtual one man army of the IIT Kanpur team. He won all the track events except the hurdles. IIT Bombay came close behind IIT Kanpur in the race for the Athletics Championship, thanks to a spirited team effort by Jagdeesh, Basak, Partha, Satya and other guys in the IIT Bombay athletics team.  Weight Lifting was eventually won by IIT Bombay but not without its share of hiccups. Till the very end nobody was sure who would win the crucial Weight Lifting 10 points. Thanks to Jackal and Partha, Bombay just managed to retain the Weight Lifting trophy by a slim margin.

Cricket was probably one of the most exciting events at the meet. Throughout the qualifying matches, Reddy and his team from IIT Bombay seemed to be the favourites to lift the trophy. But as it always happens in one day cricket, luck seemed to favor Kharagpur this time as they won the trophy from IIT Madras in the final match.  

Football saw IIT Bombay regain its lost form and win the trophy despite all odds. Half the players in the team were injured and nobody really expected them to even reach the finals. However when it was time to face the final crunch, the experienced K Ravider and his team demolished IIT Delhi by a formidable 2-0 margin.   Volleyball was a cake walk for Bombay all the way. Sreedhar, Madhu, Goli, Bhatia Sari and others in the IIT Bombay volley team seemed to have had done their homework well as they outdid every other team with ease. 

The race for the Hockey trophy had set the teams working on their calculators as all teams seemed to be evenly balanced in the league matches. Fortunately for Bombay, at the end of the final day, the mathematics seemed to settle down to them winning the trophy provided they win against Madras by a margin of at least a goal. The Bombay team showed a high level of maturity and kept this aim in sight throughout their deciding match against Madras. Their efforts paid off finally as IIT Bombay lifted the coveted Hockey trophy.

The Basketball matches were the greatest crowd-puller of the meet with the crowd even getting pretty emotional at times. Encouraged by the strong crowd backing, the flashy colored home team, led by Siddharth Joshi, won the Basketball Championship for IIT Bombay. The deciding match was the one held on the final day against IIT Delhi, which IIT Bombay won by a nail-biting margin. Tennis again saw IIT Bombay upset the champions IIT Delhi and win the trophy, thanks to a fine performance by Hemkar and Ramanathan. The Badminton Trophy went to IIT Kharagpur with Arpit of IIT Kharagpur leading the team.

The General Championship of Inter-IIT 98 went to IIT Bombay as they accounted for the maximum points. Incidentally this has been the best performance by any team so far as far as points is concerned. IIT Bombay won a total of 98 points, just 2 short of a perfect 100! The previous highest total by any IIT at an Inter-IIT meet has been 93 points. Keep up the spirit Bombay, and lets hope next year we surpass that elusive 100 point barrier!