The Queen's Baton Relay for the Commonwealth Games was welcomed in Bangalore Thursday by school children, sports enthusiasts and sports stars.

The baton, which arrived here from Mysore, about 130 km away, was received at the Sree Kanteerava stadium by Sports and Youth Affairs Minister Goolihatti Shekar, Law Minister S. Suresh Kumar and Karnataka Olympic Association president K. Govindaraj.

They handed over the baton to badminton legend Prakash Padukone and Karnataka's first Olympian Kenneth Powell to start the over five km relay that went through Rajaram Mohun Roy Road, Mission Road, Lalbagh Road, Kengal Hanumanthaiah Road, Kasturba Road and Ambedkar Veedhi before returning to the stadium.

Reeth Abraham, David Premanath, Ashwini Nachappa, Uday K.Prabhu, Rosa Kutty (athletics), A.B. Subbaiah, M.P.Ganesh, Sabhu Varkey (hockey), Chetan Babbar(table tennis), Sampath Kumar, Yathiraj (football) and M. Venu (boxing) were among the several sportspersons who took party in the relay.

The baton will reach Goa Sep 7 after travelling through Hassan, Mangalore and Karwar.