| MUMBAI:
Amrita TV has won the exclusive satellite live telecast rights for the 55th Nehru
Trophy Boat Race to be held on 11 August at Alappuzha in Kerala. The
telecast will cover the 1400 m track length race comprising over 50 boats of various
sizes manned by over 3000 oarsmen - including men and women. The
Nehru trophy boat race on the Punnamda Lake near Alappuzha held on the second
Saturday of August every year is believed to be the most competitive and popular
of the boat races. On
the day of the event, the lake has an audience of estimated two lakh people, including
tourists from abroad. For the people of each village in Kuttanad, Alappuzha, a
victory at this race for their village boat is something to be celebrated for
months to come, states an official release. The
race termed as 'Kuttanad's Olympics on Water' has the major attraction in the
form of competition of 16 chundanvallams or snake boats measuring over 100 feet
in length, with nearly 90 oarsmen in one snake boat. The
first race was an impromptu one conducted at Alappuzha in 1952 in honour of former
prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru who after seeing the event jumped into the award-winning
boat and it proceeded to the boat jetty carrying the Prime Minister. On
his return to Delhi, Nehru donated a trophy, which is a replica of a snake boat
placed on a wooden abacus - and subsequently the event came to be known as the
Nehru Trophy Boat Race. | 
