I honestly don’t know who is right, and who wrong. I don’t know what the outcome of the investigation will be. I don’t know if the sexual harassment charges can be proved. But with the world watching in shock and disbelief, this issue is getting graver by the minute.
If the shocking scenes on May 28 May were not enough, we now have this. The wrestlers will throw their medals – medals won for India, and by India, on the greatest sporting stage of all – into the Ganga at 6pm on Tuesday evening. Again, I don’t know if they are right or wrong. What I can say is that it has left us all in shock. And pain.
Why did it come to this? Could it not have been better handled? Could we not find a resolution to this? Will this carry on, with India losing out every single day?
We need to be able to find answers. Every grave crisis has a way out. This too does. We need intervention. We need empathy and better handling. We need urgent resolution.
Some will say that this is being done for optics. Even if that is the truth, India is losing out in the process. And we can’t ignore the fact that theseare famed sportsmen and women who have brought laurels to the country. We can’t ignore the fact that the world is watching our every move. We are a country that has a lot of to be proud of. And this isn’t something that is doing our reputation any good.
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Also, can they actually do such a thing for symbolism without disrespecting the sacrifices that the common man has made, by paying for their training abroad en route to winning those medals? Yes, we have read of Muhammed Ali doing something similar after the Rome Olympics in 1960. In The Greatest, his autobiography published in 1975, he wrote: “I came back to Louisville after the Olympics with my shiny gold medal. Went into a luncheonette where black folks couldn’t eat. Thought I’d put them on the spot. I sat down and asked for a meal. The Olympic champion wearing his gold medal. They said, ‘We don’t serve niggers here.’ I said, ‘That’s okay, I don’t eat ’em.’ But they put me out in the street. So I went down to the river, the Ohio River, and threw my gold medal in it.”
But the USA in 1960 and the India of today are two very different countries. The context and the time are not remotely comparable. India is not the USA or the UK. Every penny that has been spent by the government on these athletes is money taken from the common man’s plate. A common man who often doesn’t get even one square meal a day. When we struggle to feed our billion-plus population, sport is still a luxury. And no expense has been spared when it comes to these athletes and their training.
Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, the wrestling federation chief who is the target of their ire, did not spend that money. The government did. And in turn, the common man paid for it. We need to respect that sacrifice. These medals belong to India. While I completely understand and respect their desperation, I really don’t think that throwing India’s medals away is the answer.
Whichever side one is on, or has taken, it is time to come together and seek a way out. Find an end to this impasse. For India’s sake. For the common man, whose empty stomach paid for those medals.
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