‘Narak se swarag’: How one family turned hell into a Commonwealth gold medal

“Mere ko nangi kar ke meri betiyon ke sath sadak pe faink diya tha mere pehle husband ne. (My first husband stripped me naked and threw me and my daughters out of the house.) My neighbours wrapped me in a quilt and my parents took us away. I was married at 19; he was a drug addict, and things only got worse after my second daughter was born. As I hold this gold medal in Glasgow, my message to every woman and daughter in India is to fight back against abuse,” Sharmila, who suffered polio in one leg at the age of two, told The Indian Express minutes after her win.

Her mother Santosh, blind from birth, had listened to the win on television. “My daughter was the topper from class one to class ten. But our financial condition wasn’t good, so we had to marry her off. When it happened, I told my husband we had to go bring her back. This gold is Sharmila’s jazba (spirit),” Santosh says.

Six years and a divorce later, in 2018, Sharmila’s parents got her remarried, to Ajit Singh, a submersible pump technician.
That same year, after the Haryana Roadways Employees union called a strike, she was hired on a three-month contract as the state’s first female bus conductor, only to lose the job again once the strike ended.

India’s Sharmila Dhankar, left, and Shilpa K Shyla celebrate after winning gold and bronze medals respectively in the women’s shot put F57 at the 23rd Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. (PTI)

“Relatives called me a home wrecker when I stayed at my parents’ home. I worked for eighteen days as a conductor before I lost that job too. All I asked of Ajit, when his proposal came, was that he support me and my daughters,” she says.

Ajit introduced her to kabaddi first, then took her to Tula Ram Stadium in Rewari to train under Paralympian-coach Tek Chand. He sent her daughters, Anuj and Laxmi, into athletics too, left his own job, and took loans to keep the training going. “Narak se swarag banana chahta tha main Sharmila aur betiyon ke liye. I wanted to turn hell into heaven for Sharmila and our daughters. I saw para sports on TV and started her on kabaddi, then took her to Tek Chand,” Ajit says.

Tek Chand, who competed in the same F57 category himself, taught her to throw standing with the support of a pole. “He made sure my basics became very strong,” Sharmila says.

She won her first national title, competed at the Birmingham Para CWG and finished fourth at the Hangzhou Asian Para Games. A year before Glasgow, her father died, and Santosh sold half an acre of the family’s farmland to keep her daughter’s training going. “I was born without vision, but I have raised four children and run this house. When Sharmila needed money, we sold our land,” Santosh says.

Sharmila Dhankar with husband Ajit Singh and daughters Anuj and Laxmi (Special arrangement)

She moved to train under coach Virender Dhankar in Sonepat, rewrote her national mark with a 9.77m throw in Dubai last year, and picked up shot put gold and discus bronze at the Fazza International Para Athletics meet this year. In Glasgow, teammate Shilpa K Shyla added bronze in the same event, a rare double Indian podium.

PCI chief coach Satya Narayana, who trains both women, believes the best is still ahead. “It was cold here, and Sharmila showed this is the start of a dominating phase. She’s 40, but the way she trains, she can carry on for another four or five years,” he says.

Sharmila has one more wish left. “I started competing at 33. I want to see both my daughters qualify for the Games too, Anuj in javelin, Laxmi in long jump, so the three of us can compete together one day,” she says.

At home, Anuj and Laxmi burst crackers on Monday night. “Mummy suffered a lot, especially after I was born. But she never stopped pushing us,” Laxmi says.

Santosh is still waiting up. “She likes dahi churma, or bajre ka churma, to celebrate,” she says.