Four-time world chess champion Viswanathan Anand will be among the few sportspersons who will welcome the Queen's Baton Relay (QBR) for the Delhi Commonwealth Games when it reaches Chennai on Friday.
Besides Anand, tennis legend Ramesh Krishnan, former Asian Games 800m gold medallist Shiny Wilson, squash ace Joshna Chinappa and former Indian hockey captain Mohammad Riaz will also participate in the relay.
Also to be seen with the baton, which makes its journey from the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, will be hockey player Vijay Philips, Arjuna and Dronacharya Awardee G Sreedharan, athlete Gyaneshwaran and former champion swimmers Sebastian Xavier and Wilson Cherian.
The baton will travel to Puducherry on Saturday before touching Thanjavur, Rameshwaram, Madurai and Kanyakumari, then reaching Kerala on August 26 before coming back to Tamil Nadu to visit Wellington and Ootacamund before it heads for Karnataka on September 1.
The Chennai leg would mark the 56th day of the 100 day relay. The South India leg of the relay commenced last week in Hyderabad and travelled through Andhra Pradesh, touching Vishakapatnam, Vijaywada and Tirupati before moving on to Port Blair in the Andaman Islands.
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