Imphal, August 30: Host Manipur wrested the overall team title of the two-day 1st North East Zone Junior Athletics Championship that concluded at Khuman Lampak Main Stadium this afternoon.

Manipur athletes swelled its medal total to 55 with the addition of a whooping 33 medals today to finish the competition on 22 gold, 17 silver and 16 bronze medals.

The hosts also bagged best male and female athlete titles with M Samananda hogging the limelight in boys competition and Asma Bhanu declared as the outstanding girl athlete.

While Tripura secured the runners-up position in boys section Assam girls had to settle behind Manipur.

Tripura, also occupied the overall runners-up spot on nine gold, 10 silver and four bronze medals followed by Assam in third place with a championship haul of seven gold, seven silver and five bronze medals.

While Meghalaya and Nagaland managed to grab one gold and two silver medals each, the former pipped Nagaland to the fourth place race with nine bronze medals compared to since by their nearest rivals. sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh failed to open their medal account while Mizoram made its presence felt with two silver and three bronze medals.

The closing ceremony of the inaugural junior level athletic championships for the north eastern States organised by Athletic Association of Manipur (AAM) was held with Deputy director (YAS) Ch Shantikumar Singh, AAM president L Ajit Singh and joint secretary of Athletic Federation of India AK Surjit Singh as the chief guest, president and guest of honour respectively.

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