Athletes miss out on London Olympics qualifier for Rs 30,000

TOI

Bangalore, 05 Jul 2012: What exactly does Rs 30,000 mean in these inflationary times? Well, if you’re a champion athlete in India, it could mean the end of a dream.

 

P Kunhumohammed, India’s best hope for the London Olympics in men’s 400m, needed that sum to make it to the national athletics competition of Sri Lanka, beginning on Thursday.

 

The event represented his last chance to qualify for the Olympics. But lack of funds and official apathy crushed his hopes, and also those of Joseph G Abraham, Asian Games gold medallist in the 400m hurdles.

 

"We knocked on several doors in Kerala but no one came forward. I checked my account and it had only Rs 9,000," Kunhumohammed told TOI.

 

’He wasn’t asking for any big sum’

India’s top athletes P Kunhumohammed (400m) and Joseph Abraham (400m hurdles) will not be able to compete in Sri Lanka’s national athletics championship, the Indian duo’s last chance for qualifying for the London Olympics, due to lack of funds.

 

"We knew it was the last chance (for London) and we got them entries with great difficulty but I heard that they are not competing," Athletics Federation of India secretary CK Valson said.

 

Lijo Thottan, assistant national coach, echoed the disappointment of the two athletes and said that despite his best efforts there was nobody to help. "Kunhu and Joseph called me on Tuesday morning and said their entries had been confirmed but they had no money and they needed to catch the afternoon flight from Delhi to Colombo. I contacted the sports council president and association officials but the reply was negative.

 

"Sports council president (Padmini Thomas) said there was no provision for advance payment. I also approached the Kerala Athletics Association but they too couldn’t do much as the president was out of station," said the former athlete who represented India at the 2000 Sydney Games.

 

Lijo said it was sad that government agencies had no funds to help an athlete in case of an emergency. "Here was an athlete who was on the verge of qualifying and he was not asking for any big sum. All he needed was Rs 30,000 so that he could make one last effort to qualify for the Games. Our system needs to change to help a sportsperson in case of an emergency," he said.

 

Kunhumohammed, who clocked a personal best of 46.14 seconds at the Asian GP in Thailand in May, was targeting the qualification mark of 45.90s. "If we had got a few more competitions in a strong field we would have easily qualified. But after the Federation Cup in Patiala in April our next chance came only in July at the inter-state meet," he said.

 

Joseph Abraham came close to qualifying at the Federation Cup timing 49.98s as against the criterion of 49.80s in the 400m hurdles.

 

The duo last competed at the Asian All-Star athletics meet in Almaty, Kazakhstan.

 

The AFI should also take the blame for failing to chalk out a proper calendar which would have given the maximum chances to Olympic hopefuls. Several athletes complained about the big gap with no domestic competition between April and June. All this after the central government spent crores on Olympic probables under the OPEX scheme.