Anil Kumar Prakash Biography 
Anil Kumar Prakash is an Indian athlete who hails from Alappuzha, Kerala. Born on 28 August 1978, he has now retired from active career. India’s faster sprinter previously held the 100 metres national record of 10.30 s. He set this record at the National Circuit Athletic Meet held in New Delhi in 2005 winning the gold, and after 11 years the record was broken in 2016 by Amiya Kumar Mallick with new time, 10.26 s. In 2000 Asian Championships held at Jakarta, Indonesia, Anil finished at second place with a silver (time 10.35). 20.73 (set at Bangalore in 2000) is his personal best time in 200 metres, and was a national record too.
Anil Kumar Prakash was born in Alappuzha in 1978. He studied at T. K. Madhava Memorial College, Nangiarkulangara. Since college days, he fully concentrated on to his career as an athlete. He was deeply inspired and influenced by the success and dedication of P. T. Usha, which promoted him to take it as profession. In 1994, he joined the Madras Engineer Group through sports quota. He participated in Army Championships. In 1994 and 1996, he timed 10.30 seconds and 9.99 seconds respectively while using a handheld stopwatch, but didn’t consider official to enter record books.
During National Open Championships in 1997 held in Gandhinagar he broke Rajeev Balakrishnan's record of 100 metres to become the fastest man in India. He had to take a break for one season following injury, and when he returned in 1999, he clocked 10.58 s in the 100 metres and a 21.35 s in 200 metres at Fifth National Games in Manipur. On 17 July 2000, Kumar broke the 200 metres National record with an effort of 20.73 s. Abdul Najeeb Qureshi went on to equal his record in the 100m event, although was slower by 0.2 milliseconds, and finally the record was broken in 2016.
Published: October 15, 2018
Updated: October 21, 2018
