Sydney is not enough for Medal Malleswari

NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 4: She arrived a couple of hours late. Yet none of the hundreds, who had crowded the Indira Gandhi International Airpor...

NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 4: She arrived a couple of hours late. Yet none of the hundreds, who had crowded the Indira Gandhi International Airport from 8 in the evening to welcome the bronze girl did not leave the waiting hall.

Karnam Malleswari was the toast of the evening. The track legend, PT Usha, who in a wonderful gesture arrived at the airport to welcome the Olympic medal winner said it all. “I am proud of Malleswari,” said Usha. “She has won an Olympic medal which I couldn’t achieve during my career.”

Amid chants of Malleswari zindabad’, the iron lady, who salvaged the pride of one billion Indians at the Sydney Olympics, stepped into the waiting hall, into the outstretched hands of her mother. Some tried to touch her, feel those hands which lifted 240 kgs and a bronze in the women’s weightlifting (69kg category) event.

The hundreds of fans right from a five-year-old kid to a 70-year old, who had come all the way from Sector 10 of Technological Consultant Centre at Faridabad, wanted their bahu’ to speak, to say something about her historic trip Down Under. And she did. “No, I am not retiring. I will try to win another medal in the next Games,” said Malleswari, who became India’s first woman to win a medal in Olympics. She even hinted about launching an academy to groom more Malleswaris’ for the country. “I will speak to the Haryana Chief Minister and hope to get financial support from him.”