ENTITLEMENT – the belief that one is inherently deserving of privileges or special treatment. Two Indian sporting legends – the country’s boxing queen MC Mary Kom and celebrated wrestler Shushil Kumar – have for a while now been united by that very common failing in Indian sport: a reluctance to allow younger talents to blossom.
Peevish, petulant, graceless. All terms that could be applied equally to arguably India’s greatest exponents of their respective disciplines in the 21st century.
There’s a BIG difference though. While Mary Kom has remained at the top of her sport pretty much throughout the last decade, Shushil Kumar has done little of note since securing a second Olympic Bronze medal in succession at London 2012, to add to the first he won at Beijing 2008.
After the Rio 2016 Olympics fiasco, in which India went unrepresented in the 74kg category despite having a quota, Sushil started competing in major events in 2018. He won the CWG Gold but made early exits at the Asian Games later that year and also the 2019 World Championships – the first Olympic qualification event.
The latest act by the two-time Olympic medalist after opting out of Friday’s selection trials in New Delhi for next month’s Asian Championships and the continental Olympic qualifying event to be held in March, was a request/demand that the they postpone the men’s freestyle 74kg category. Why? He had injured his shoulder. That there were others also looking to qualify was of no consequence to the grappler.
Credit to the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) for refusing to accept the demand. Net result? Five months after losing a controversial bout to Indian wrestling’s one-time great, 74kg contender Jitender now has the chance to end the veteran’s Olympic dream altogether. The 25-year-old earned the right to represent India at both Asian Championships and Asian Olympic qualifying tournament by winning the trials on Friday after getting past three tough opponents in the course of the day.
The Asia/Oceania zone Olympic Qualifiers for Tokyo 2020 will be held in Wuhan, China from February 3-14.
As already noted, the distaff side of this sorry saga has a very different tale to tell. Mary Kom defeated Nikhat Zareen in the summit clash of the 51 kg category at the women’s boxing trials for the Olympic qualifiers held in the capital last Saturday. The six-time world champion and Olympic Bronze medallist got the better of her challenger with a 9-1 split decision victory.
With the win, Mary Kom will now represent India at the Olympic qualifiers, which are scheduled to be held in China in February next year.
To quote the Manipuri boxing legend after her victory: “Let me conclude by saying, I fought my way through bureaucracy and politics when I was a nobody. The day I realise I am no good any more, I will hang up my gloves. I will never stand in between an upcoming boxer and their dreams. I love the sport. I am competing even today to win an Olympic gold medal for India. Not for myself or my state but for India. If you cannot respect me for the medals I have won over the years, atleast respect me for what I am. Respect for every human being is what makes one a good as opposed to a bad human being.”
All well and good but that was NOT her stated position before being forced to compete in the trials. Mary Kom had earlier said: “BFI should decide who should go and hold no trials for the boxers who are performing consistently. Those boxers should get direct quota to tournaments.”
And neither was any of it shown by the athlete who is the International Olympic Council’s (IOC’s) ambassador for her sport at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics either in her post victory behaviour OR comments.
It is her younger defeated opponent Nikhat who showed that. And in spades. Nikhat maintains that her fight was not against Mary Kom but against a system that was not giving her a fair chance to prove herself in her weight category and go for the big competitions.
As Nikhat told IANS: “She (Mary Kom) is a legend so she shouldn’t have anything to fear. We are all juniors in front of her. She should always be ready for the trials and be a good example for the youth. Now she has defeated me and gone for the Olympic qualifier and everyone is happy which would not have been the case if she had gone directly without giving anyone else a chance to even assess themselves against her. Hume bhi pata chale hum kitne paani me hai (We should also know where we stand). We should know where we are lacking and for that I stood up and raised my voice. There should be a trial before every competition. I lost the bout but I won hearts on that day and I am happy.”
Ironically, when asked for his view on l’affaire Mary Kom, Sushil Kumar had said in an interview: “No one is above rules and regulations. For every player, rules are the same. I would like to say this is a very small thing for Mary. Mary should set an example and not indulge in this. People look up to her. She is a role model. She should give trials. It’s the right of every sportsperson to fight a trial of his or her level and category. I don’t think there is anything wrong in asking for trials. Even I had given so many trials even after winning the double Olympic medal.”
We give the last word to India’s only individual Olympic Gold medallist – shooter Abhinav Bindra – who posted his Twitter handle while the controversy was raging: “While I have all the respect for Marykom, Fact is, an athlete’s life is an offering of proof. Proof that we can be as good as yesterday. Better than yesterday. Better than tomorrows man /woman. In sport, yesterday NEVER counts.”
If India genuinely has ambitions to be a sporting power, then transparent systems and processes are a prerequisite. The bald truth is that India is STILL to add to Bindra’s individual Gold won at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. And it will likely remain that way unless the custodians of India’s sporting destiny wake up to the reality that brushing aside difficult questions and optimistic talk does NOT deliver results on the world stage.
