53 injured soldiers, one new mission: Inside an ambitious Army programme

These days, the 42-year-old Sema, who has a prosthetic limb, is doing a lot more than walking. His career has taken flight: at the 2024 Paralympic Games in Paris, Sema returned with a bronze medal in the men’s F57 shot put event.  With a long list of medals to his name, Sema is one of the star athletes of the Army Paralympic Node (APN), a centre of excellence that handpicks Armymen with permanent, life-altering injuries and provides them with specialised training in sport.

With a long list of medals to his name, Hakato Sema is one of the star athletes of the Army Paralympic Node (Express photo by Arul Horizon)

Sema’s colleagues at the Node are equally distinguished: at last month’s Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, Soman Rana won gold while Shubham Juyal claimed silver in men’s F57 shot put — the same category that Sema competes in.

Set up in 2017, the Node’s role and contribution in helping soldiers do what they are instinctively built for — putting up a fight when life throws them at the deep end — was recognised when it was named for the 2025 Rashtriya Khel Protsahan Puraskar, which will be handed over by President Droupadi Murmu. Since the award was instituted by the Government of India in 2009, several major corporations, sports boards, and NGOs have received the honour.

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“The goal of the Army Paralympic Node is to give people with amputations or severe injuries a ray of hope. We help them accept whatever has happened and then give them a direction for the rest of their life,” says Lieutenant Colonel Daljit Singh, who is the Officer in Charge of the centre.

Life at the Node

If it takes a village to raise a child, it takes an entire ecosystem to build a high-performance athlete.

Since the Node can only select athletes from a small pool of Army personnel who have suffered body-altering injuries, much of the talent scouting happens at two institutions in Pune — the Army’s Artificial Limb Centre (ALC) and the Spinal Cord Injury Centre (SCIC) that’s based in Military Hospital Kirkee.

The Node was the brainchild of Colonel (Retd) Gaurav Dutta, whose left leg had to be amputated after he stepped on a mine in 2001. As he started competing in triathlons with an artificial limb, Dutta realised the potential of sport in shaping the lives of Armymen who suffered from life-changing injuries. Dutta became the Node’s first Officer in Charge when it came up in 2017.

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While the Node is headquartered in Pune, the 53 Paralympic athletes it trains are currently spread across four cities: track-and-field athletes, archers, swimmers, triathletes, rowers and sports climbers train in various facilities in Pune, shooters at the Army Marksmanship Unit in Mhow, taekwondo athletes are based in Bengaluru and the canoeists and kayakers train in Bhopal. The funding, training and technical aspects of athletes are looked after by the Mission Olympic Wing of the Army, and the administrative aspects are taken care of by the Bombay Engineers Group and Centre Kirkee.

Every week, coaches from the Node and Officer In Charge Daljit Singh visit the two centres, the Artificial Limb Centre and the Spinal Cord Injury Centre, with an eye out for athletes they can potentially recruit. But much before they can train the soldiers into world beaters, or even decide who to pick as they scout for talent, the team has to listen to young men grappling with the physical and mental trauma of losing a limb.

Solairaj Dharmaraj, who competes in the long jump T64 event, won a gold at the Para Asian Games in 2023 (Express photo by Arul Horizon)

“Hum sapne dikhate hain (We show them dreams),” says Subedar Harendra Yadav, who works as a swimming and triathlon coach at the Node. What he means is that he and the others teach young men, many of them teetering on the edge after a devastating blow, to dream on.

“People who have congenital issues from birth are already used to it by the time they are adults. But for these athletes, it’s a shock. Life changes in the blink of an eye,” says Subedar Anuj Kumar, who is an archery coach at the centre.

Training athletes once they get here is the easiest part of their job, says Subedar S K Mortaja, who is a sprints coach. “The biggest fight is convincing athletes to come to the Node for the first time. Motivating someone whose life has just changed overnight is the challenging part,” he says.

It helps, though, that they are dealing with soldiers. “Fauji aadmi mentally strong hote hain (Soldiers are mentally strong). Once they are at the Node, they can do anything they set out to do.”

The Node’s track-and-field athletes, archers, swimmers, triathletes, rowers and sports climbers train in various facilities in Pune (Express photo by Arul Horizon)

Node coaches usually pick potential athletes and sportspersons based on their body structure — those with a more muscular build are, for instance, chosen for sprint events. Those handpicked to compete are also given peer-to-peer counselling, where someone already training at the Node speaks to a soldier who has just had an amputation.

There have been times when the coaches have had to spend several months talking to a potential candidate before he can join the Node. They even reach out to families and commanding officers of the injured Armyman to build their case.

Ajay Kumar, a blade runner who competes in the 400m T64 running event, needed a lot of cajoling to join the Node. Part of the elite Ghatak Platoon in the

12 Dogra Regiment, Ajay lost a limb in a mine blast in Uri in 2017.

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His initial days of walking with a prosthetic limb were so painful that “everything from my leg to my brain would hurt”. Running was the last thing on his mind, and he rebuffed attempts by the Node coaches to enrol him. Eventually, he gave in. Today, he’s a silver medallist at the Para Asian Games in 2023.

Days at the Node are geared towards one singular purpose: win medals for the country. Athletes train twice a day and have regular gym sessions.

“We do training in the morning from 7 to 9.30 am, then again in the evening from 4 to 7 pm,” says Sub Major Rakesh Rawat of the 15 Jat Regiment, a sitting throws coach at the Node.

Rawat explains the impact these hard yards in training can have.

“Shubham Juyal joined us at the Node three years ago. He had never lifted weights. No weight training ever. We taught him the technique behind holding the weightlifting bar. Last month, he won a Commonwealth Games silver medal at Glasgow in shot put,” says Rawat.

‘Dream of flying’

On a wall-mounted board inside the Army’s Artificial Limb Centre in Pune hang a curious mix of implements. On one side of the wall are an axe and a steel sickle, its teeth glistening in the light. Next to them are everyday items, a few forks and spoons. Completing the set of about 50 items hanging from the wall are Captain Hook-style metallic hooks. These are various activity-specific attachments that the centre has for people who have lost a hand.

A few metres away from this wall of assorted metal instruments is a gas stove, a mixer-grinder and a refrigerator. In an adjoining room is another wooden board hanging from the wall — called the Daily Living Training Board — with various door fittings, latches and electric switches next to faucets. A dressing table with a mirror, with combs on the dresser, too, finds a place in this room.

Swimmer Kapil Kumar competes in the 100m, 200m and 400m freestyle events (Express photo by Arul Horizon)

It’s a space where Armymen injured in combat are taught to start from the beginning, relearning the mechanics of everyday life — turning a doorknob, opening a refrigerator and picking up a bottle of water.

Outside these rooms is a bigger gym-like space for athletes with prosthetic lower limbs, with walkways with bars on either side to hold on to, a machine that calculates the force each foot exerts on the ground while walking, another with steps on one side and a slope on the other for athletes to learn how to climb stairs and walk down slopes.

With a 500-strong team that includes psychologists, family counsellors, physiotherapists, limb makers and surgeons, the scope of the Artificial Limb Centre is much wider than its name suggests. The centre also refits those who walk in through its doors with, as the shot put athlete Sema put it, “hausla aur himmat (morale and courage)” .

Helping an injured soldier get into a prosthesis and then helping them walk, and even compete, is one of the ways of ensuring that dark thoughts do not take hold.

At the Artificial Limb Centre, Pune, injured soldiers relearn the mechanics of everyday life (Express photo by Arul Horizon)

“We give people who come here a way to a productive and functional life. In some cases, we get them into either recreational or competitive sports. At the Artificial Limb Centre, we have our in-house operation theatre, where we do amputations, and also help with early mobilisation. Usually, people wait for six months but we are able to get patients back on their feet within a week of the amputation,” says Brigadier CN Satish, Commandant at the Centre.

The centre has also pioneered prostheses such as the Phoenix Foot (a prosthetic that provides natural ankle movements with shock-absorption capability) and the Rowing Foot (a foot that offers rowers a range of movement). The Rowing Foot was developed specifically for rowers such as K Narayana, who competed at the Paris Paralympics in 2024 and won a silver medal at the Asian Para Games in 2023.

The Artificial Limb Centre has pioneered prostheses such as the Phoenix Foot and the Rowing Foot (Express photo by Arul Horizon)

“About 80 per cent of our work here is with regular amputees, who don’t compete in elite sport. We first make them pain-free, then make a leg or an arm for them, make them walk, then do advanced activities. We try to push them into some trials here and whoever is a potential candidate for para sport, we send them to the Paralympic Node,” says Colonel GP Reddy, a surgeon at the Artificial Limb Centre. “The athletes we send to the Node are our pride. It’s the institute’s pride that we are able to put them on an international platform and help them win the country medals.”

The unofficial motto for anyone coming there, as Reddy puts it, is, “Chalna nahi hai, daudna hai. Aur udne ka target rakho (The aim is not just to walk, but to run. And dream of flying).”

‘It’s all written in your stars’

On a Thursday morning at the Army Sports Institute in Pune, athletes of the Node are training hard, chasing that ambition — to fly. Fittingly, their two training sessions a day are punctuated by the sound of airplanes taking off from an airstrip nearby.

Some of the athletes are on the running track, their blades making rhythmic clicks on the track as they chase a time on the clock. Others are in an adjoining gym, chasing personal bests with heavy weights.

With the Paris Paralympics and the Commonwealth Games behind them, the Node has a new target in sight: the Para Asian Games in September. (Express photo by Arul Horizon)

With the Paris Paralympics and the Commonwealth Games behind them, they have a new target in sight: the Para Asian Games in September, where at least 10 athletes from the Node will compete for medals.

Close to the ASI campus, at Training Battalion 2 of the Bombay Sappers, throwers Sema and Rana are sweating away.

Sema was a ‘Sipahi’ when the blast happened. Today, he’s a Subedar in the Army, with an Arjuna Award and an Ati Vishisht Seva Medal to his name.

“Likhke rakha hota hai kundali (It’s all written in your stars). If the blast had not happened, I would not have competed in elite sport, all these accolades would not have come to me and I would not have made India proud in so many competitions. Life main sab kuch mila hai (I have got everything in life),” he smiles.