Denied berth in India’s World Championships squad, PU Chitra runs to court

Chitra’s exclusion has turned into an emotive issue in her home state with chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan promising to take up the matter with the central government, while leader of opposition Ramesh Chennithala has written to sports minister Vijay Goel demanding that the athlete be included in the squad.

Chitra’s lawyer Rajit said on Tuesday: “Chitra won the gold but was not picked when the team was announced. The Athletics Federation of India’s (AFI) chairman of selectors and secretary have to explain based on what criteria the Indian team was picked and why Chitra was excluded.” The next hearing is scheduled for Thursday.

The deadline for submitting entries for the World Championships expired on Monday night.

GS Randhawa, the AFI’s chairman of selectors, said on Tuesday that the committee had to exclude certain athletes as their performances were not up to scratch.

“We decided to only select those athletes who had achieved performances close to IAAF’s qualifying marks and not everyone who had won gold at the Asian Championships. China and Japan didn’t field their top athletes at the Asian Championships so the AFI had to conduct a closer scrutiny of the performances of our athletes,” Randhawa said.

AFI secretary CK Valson said that winning gold at an ‘area meet’ does not always guarantee entry to the World Championships. “Take the case of G Lakshmanan, who won gold in the 10,000m and 5,000m at the Asian Championships. The IAAF has given him entry only in the 5,000. Lakshmanan improved his timing in the 5,000 at the National Inter-state meet at Guntur, which was held after the Asian Championships,” Valson said.

The AFI secretary also said that the IAAF had not yet given Swapna Burman an entry in the heptathlon, though she won gold at the Asian championships.

Burman had registered a personal best in the seven-event discipline. She totalled 5,942 points at Bhubaneswar, well short of the 6,200 mark set by the IAAF.

Lakshmanan’s winning time in the 10,000m at Bhubaneswar was over two minutes slower than the World Championships qualifying standard and in the 5,000m, he was over a minute-and-a-half short. However, he won gold in the shorter race at Guntur with a timing of 14:07.76 — an improvement on the 14:54.48 at the Asian Championships — and the progress he made convinced the selectors to include him.

Dip in performance

Chitra’s performance dipped after the Asian Championships. In Bhubaneswar, she had lowered her personal best in the 1,500m by over six seconds to win gold with a timing of 4:17.92. The qualifying standard in this event is 4:07.50. But a week later in Guntur, she slipped to 4:28.87 and finished second.

“We must keep in mind this is the World Championships and the IAAF takes the final call on an entry of an athlete who has won an area meet based on where he or she stands in terms of performance. There is no guarantee that an athlete who has won gold at the Asian Championships will get entry,” Valson added.

But in Chitra’s home state, emotions are running high.

Chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan threw his weight behind the athlete who hails from Mundur, Palakkad. “The omission/expulsion of athlete PU Chitra, who is not just Kerala’s but India’s pride, from the world athletics championship is worth protesting. There is no justification for turning the back on a talented sportsperson. We will raise this issue with the central government. We must defeat efforts like these that try to stifle the hopes of Kerala athletes. The state govt will provide all kinds of support for Chitra,” Vijayan said in a Facebook post.

Chitra’s coach Sijin NS believes the experience of participating in a global event would have held his 22-year-old ward in good stead. “The AFI has denied her a golden opportunity. She is a talented athlete who has won gold at the Asian Athletics Championships. There is no logic in not including her in the team,” he said.

When Chitra learnt about her omission, she was heartbroken, Sijin said. “Her parents work on a field for a daily wage. They don’t even own the land. She has come up the hard way. The AFI should be encouraging young athletes like her,” Sijin said.

The AFI announced a 28-member squad, including 10 women on Sunday.

Two other gold medallists from the Asian championships — men’s 1,500m winner Ajay Kumar Saroj and women’s 3,000m steeplechase champion Sudha Singh — were also excluded from the squad.