Sania Mirza, left, alongside doubles partner Martina Hingis after winning the Family Circle Cup tournament that propelled her to World No 1. Mic Smith / AP Photo
Sania Mirza, left, alongside doubles partner Martina Hingis after winning the Family Circle Cup tournament that propelled her to World No 1. Mic Smith / AP Photo

Sachin Tendulkar among Indians lavishing praise on top-ranked tennis player Sania Mirza



Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday led the accolades for Sania Mirza after she became the first Indian woman to be crowned the world’s top-ranked doubles tennis player.

“An excellent accomplishment @MirzaSania! Congrats on being World Number 1 in doubles,” Modi, currently on a three-nation European tour, tweeted to his 11.6 million followers.

Mirza, 28, climbed to the top of the rankings after she won the Family Circle doubles title in Charleston, United States, on Sunday while partnering Swiss great Martina Hingis.

It was the third successive title for the duo, also the number one doubles pair, after their victories in the hard court events in Indian Wells and Miami.

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Messages also poured in from cricket great Sachin Tendulkar, current Test captain Virat Kohli and badminton star Saina Nehwal, who had briefly ranked as the number one singles player earlier this month.

“Congratulations to @MirzaSania on being crowned World No. 1 in doubles. Terrific achievement and will inspire more to pursue the sport,” Tendulkar tweeted.

Kohli wrote on his Twitter page: “First Saina and now @MirzaSania. Indian women conquering the No. 1 spot and making us proud! Congratulations!”

Mirza was once ranked in the top 30 in singles before a string of injuries made her take up doubles as a full-time career. She said she hoped her rise to the top would inspire women to believe in themselves.

“I hope this makes girls in India believe that anything is possible; we can achieve anything we want if we put our mind and body to it,” she said in a statement.

“I feel extremely honoured to be No.1. It’s something that I’ve worked for all my life.”

Mirza has been a trail-blazer for women’s tennis in India, despite being hounded by controversy throughout her career. She even faced a fatwa — a ruling by an Islamic religious leader — for wearing short skirts on court.

Last year a member of Modi’s Hindu nationalist BJP party in her home state of Andhra Pradesh called Mirza a “daughter-in-law of Pakistan” because of her marriage to Pakistani cricketer Shoaib Malik.

Modi had to step in to defuse the situation, inviting a furious Mirza for tea in New Delhi.

Only three other Asian women have achieved the top WTA doubles ranking: Japan’s Ai Sugiyama, China’s Peng Shuai and Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei.

The doubles pair of Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi are the only other Indians to achieve number one rankings in tennis.

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What is graphene?

Graphene is a single layer of carbon atoms arranged like honeycomb.

It was discovered in 2004, when Russian-born Manchester scientists Andrei Geim and Kostya Novoselov were "playing about" with sticky tape and graphite - the material used as "lead" in pencils.

Placing the tape on the graphite and peeling it, they managed to rip off thin flakes of carbon. In the beginning they got flakes consisting of many layers of graphene. But as they repeated the process many times, the flakes got thinner.

By separating the graphite fragments repeatedly, they managed to create flakes that were just one atom thick. Their experiment had led to graphene being isolated for the very first time.

At the time, many believed it was impossible for such thin crystalline materials to be stable. But examined under a microscope, the material remained stable, and when tested was found to have incredible properties.

It is many times times stronger than steel, yet incredibly lightweight and flexible. It is electrically and thermally conductive but also transparent. The world's first 2D material, it is one million times thinner than the diameter of a single human hair.

But the 'sticky tape' method would not work on an industrial scale. Since then, scientists have been working on manufacturing graphene, to make use of its incredible properties.

In 2010, Geim and Novoselov were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics. Their discovery meant physicists could study a new class of two-dimensional materials with unique properties. 

 

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Electoral College Victory

Trump has so far secured 295 Electoral College votes, according to the Associated Press, exceeding the 270 needed to win. Only Nevada and Arizona remain to be called, and both swing states are leaning Republican. Trump swept all five remaining swing states, North Carolina, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, sealing his path to victory and giving him a strong mandate. 

 

Popular Vote Tally

The count is ongoing, but Trump currently leads with nearly 51 per cent of the popular vote to Harris’s 47.6 per cent. Trump has over 72.2 million votes, while Harris trails with approximately 67.4 million.

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