The 19-year-old Indian tennis icon thrashed Korea's Yoo Mi 6-1, 6-4 in a lop-sided encounter which lasted just 34 minutes.

Sania, ranked 67th in the world, has been in good touch since landing in Doha.

The Hyderabad girl, seeded fourth in the singles, broke his Korean opponent in the third, fifth and seventh games to wrap up the first set in 18 minutes.

The star Indian was a little less ruthless in the second set, when she broke her rival in the second, fourth and eighth games to secure a place in the last eight stage.

Another Indian Shikha Uberoi, however, bowed out of the singles event after deciding to retire from her first round match against second seed Jie Zheng of China.

Uberoi was trailing 0-4 in the first set when she decided to pull out owing to exhaustion, having played too many matches since the silver-winning effort in the team event.

It was a sensible decision on the part of Uberoi as she had to take part in a doubles event with Sania later in the afternoon.

She had no chance against the strong Chinese, it was better to concentrate on the doubles where the Indians have a chance of winning a medal.