According to sources, Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, the country’s top badminton doubles team, will be nominated for the Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award in 2023. The greatest sporting accolade in the nation is the “Khel Ratna,” and India’s world-number-two badminton team has proven themselves deserving of this honour with their outstanding performances. The team has won five BWF World Tour championships since 2022. In January 2022, they won the Indian Open title after defeating Mohammad Ahsan and Hendra Setiawan of Indonesia 21-16, 26-24. Later that year, they had the French Open as a follow-up.
They won the Korea Open, Indonesia Open, and Swiss Open in 2023. India’s maiden BWF Super 1000 World Tour title was won in the Indonesia Open final, where they triumphed over the second-seeded Malaysian team of Aaron Chia and Wooi Yik Soh 21-17, 21-18. Soh and Chia had won world titles. They also contributed to India’s historic Thomas Cup victory. India won the trophy for the first time in the world’s premier men’s team championship, which has been held since 1949. In the final, India triumphed 3-0 over Indonesia, the most successful team in the history of the competition with 14 titles.
In Birmingham last year, Satwiksairaj and Chirag won gold in the men’s doubles category at the Commonwealth Games. They defeated the local duo of Ben Lane and Sean Vardy in two straight games. They participated in the mixed team competition as well, where they took home a silver medal.
The pair won a bronze medal at the World Championships in Dubai, just a few days after their valiant performance at CWG in Birmingham. At the World Championships in Dubai, they won a bronze medal. They won the first-ever men’s doubles medal for India in the competition. The pair, known as “Sat-Chi,” won the gold medal at the Asian Championships by defeating Ong Yew Sin and Teo Ee Yi of Malaysia in the championship match in April of this year, 16-21, 21-17, 21-19.
The pair, known as “Sat-Chi,” won the gold medal at the Asian Championships by defeating Ong Yew Sin and Teo Ee Yi of Malaysia in the championship match in April of this year, 16-21, 21-17, 21-19. They were the first Indian doubles team to take home the gold in the competition. They won the country’s first-ever badminton gold at a continental meet when they defeated South Korea’s Choi Sol-Gyu and Kim Won-ho in a gold medal match at the Asian Games this year in Hangzhou, 21-18, 21-16. They also competed for the men’s team, which took home a silver medal, making history in the badminton team events at the Asian Games for India.
The elite Indian men’s doubles team made history in October when they became the first pair from the nation to reach the top spot in the Badminton World Federation (BWF) Rankings after a string of successes.
