Indian billiards champion Pankaj Advani tweeted to sports minister Vijay Goel asking what more does he have to do in order to receive a Padma Bhushan. The Twitter exchange began when Goel congratulated Advani for the winning the national billiards championship, saying that “winning is synonymous to you. Best wishes for future games/championships”. Advani replied saying, “Thank you sir. Just feel after 16 world titles and 2 Asian games golds if I’m ignored for a padma bhushan, don’t know what more I need to do. (sic)”
The 16-time world title winner and two-time Asian Games gold medallist Pankaj Advani is clearly not a happy man for missing out yet again. Earlier, Jwala Gutta also lashed out at the sports ministry for being snubbed from the Padma awards list. The Padma Bhushan is the second highest civilian award in India. The sports personalities that are on the list of Padma award for 2017 include Virat Kohli, Sakshi Malik, PV Sindhu, Dipa Karmakar, Vikas Gowda, PR Sreejesh, and Thangavellu Mariyappan.
Advani has been a former world No. 1 in his sport and won gold medals, in the 2006 and 2010 Asian Games in Doha and Guangzhou. The national title in 2017 was number 21 for the national champion.
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