On a day when her 25-year-old son Sumit Antil broke the paralympic world record in men’s javelin throw F64 category, Nirmala Devi was busy overseeing the construction of their new home in village Khewra near Sonepat. Antil broke his own record of 70.83m with a massive throw of 73.29m at the Hangzhou Olympics Sports Centre and Devi would tell the construction workers to create a new space for the Asian Games gold medal too for her son.
“Jab bhi main puchu ki mere liye kya layega videsh se, hamesha kahega ki medal hi launga. (Whenever I ask him what will you bring for me from abroad, he always says I will certainly get you the medal). He is very particular about his world records and plans to make a marking wall at our new home. Perhaps we have to wait for the Paris Olympics to get the finishing touch,” says an elated Devi while speaking with The Indian Express.
Youngest of the four children, Antil lost his father Ram Kumar, an Indian Air Force soldier to cancer in 2004. Like many Haryana youngsters, Antil had dreams of becoming a wrestler and competed in the local dangals at his village. He also trained at the SAI Centre in Sonepat.
However, on January 5, 2015, he met with a motorbike accident on the Sonepat-Dewra road and was taken to the Base hospital in Delhi Cantt, where doctors had to take the decision to amputate his left leg.
“He stayed at the hospital for 53 days. Par hamesha hamein kehta raha ki himmat rakho (But he would always tell us to keep faith). He was very good in studies too and was going to his tuition classes when the accident happened. Sometimes he would tell us to bring his books to the hospital to make him feel good. If he would have stopped believing at that time, all these medals and glory would not have come,” says Devi.
Days after his release from the hospital, Antil made a trip to Pune with some of the savings of the family to get a prosthetic leg. A meeting with para athlete Ram Kumar made him train under Para Asian Games medallist Virender Dhankar and later under Dronacharya awardee coach Naval Singh. While Antil was advised to go for long jump or other disciplines by other athletes at the Nehru Stadium in Delhi, Antil stuck to javelin.
“Sumit’s strength from Day One has been his adaptability and not to complain about conditions. When he came to train under me, he shared the room with another athlete and would do all the chores like washing clothes or making own food too. It took a lot of time for him to adjust to the prosthetic leg and I would make him throw for a distance of 25-30 m initially. He would walk and not run as the prosthetic leg would run against his knee and blood would ooze out with multiple attempts. So he also learnt making throws while sitting at the hammer throw net. Wrestling has made his upper body muscles very strong and it’s still an advantage for him,” says Naval.
Within four years of training, Antil made a new world record in the F64 category with a throw of 61.32m at the Paris Grand Prix in 2019. He bettered the record the same year with a throw of 62.88m in the worlds in Dubai. In 2020, Antil had competed against Neeraj Chopra in the Indian Grand Prix and finished seventh with a throw of 66.43 m to qualify for the Tokyo Paralympics. Like Chopra, he too had trained in Finland.
“In 2018, we got him training in Finland with the invitation from 1988 Olympic gold medallist Tapio Korjus and Sumit competed against able bodied javelin throwers. Right from the start, his action has been like German Johannes Vetter and he used the fall technique but then he suffered elbow injuries. So we made some changes in his technique and the upper and arms and shoulders generate the jerk for him. Training against somebody like Neeraj has always helped him mentally too as he thinks about approaching the marks like 65m, 70m, 75 m the same way,” says Singh.
At Tokyo Paralympics, Antil had won the gold with a world record throw of 68.55m, bettering the world mark three times in the final. Last year, Antil had made a new world record throw of 68.62 m at Indian Open before breaching the 70m mark with a throw of 70.83 m at the worlds in Paris this year.
On Wednesday, Antil breached the 70m mark twice enroute to win the gold medal and made a new world record of 73.29m, a throw which would have placed him eighth in the Asian Games final earlier this month in Hangzhou where Chopra won the gold with a throw of 88.88m.
“The only challenge for Antil has been in getting adjusted to the new prosthetic leg whenever he gets it after multiple tournaments. It takes some time for the knee to adjust and sometimes it bleeds too. But once he gets it set, it’s all about his technique. He can cross the 75 m mark soon and who knows he can cross the 80m mark too,” says Singh.
Antil had married Sheetal last year and chose to make a new home in the village itself, with the family deciding to make a huge hall to host functions for the villagers to attend. “Sumit always says that our village is the most precious thing to our family. Hence he got the new house made here. Like always, he will ask for desi ghee food on his return,” says the mother Devi.
Antil with his wife and mother (right), who awaits with desi-ghee food for Paralympic world record breaker. (Instagram/Special Arrangement) 
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