Pratima: Cry of innocence

Dhanbad/Jamshedpur, Aug. 20: Weightlifter Pratima Kumari, who tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs in the ongoing Athens Olympics, blames her coaches for the “fiasco” and her family stands firm behind her.

Father Prem Chand Gupta, an employee of Bokaro Steel, today called for a CBI inquiry into the doping scandal in which his daughter tested positive for anabolic steroids — testosterone drugs.

In an appeal to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh through The Telegraph, Gupta alleged that her two coaches Leonid Taranekov and P.S. Sandhu conspired in support of fellow-lifter Malleshwari and got Pratima entangled in the dope test.

“My Munni (Pratima) is innocent and has been dragged into a conspiracy. I appeal to the Prime Minister to find out the truth,” pleaded the sobbing father.

Gupta, who stays at Sector IV-G in Bokaro, alleged that the coaches were not in favour of his daughter’s inclusion in the team as Pratima was lifting 235 kg (237 kg fetched silver at Athens) — much more than Malleshwari, who was in the senior category of 72-kg group. He said after the intervention of a few senior sports officials in New Delhi, Pratima was picked up, but during the two-month training at Belarus, Pratima was asked to lift much more weight with Malleshwari, resulting in acute back pain.

“My daughter called me from Belarus saying each day her pain was increasing and the coaches were not co-operating. Later, a Russian doctor was called, who was briefed in the local language, which she did not understand, but came to know later through someone else that wrong information had been fed to the physician. He was told to inject 10 shots in three days. On the first day, she was given three injections,” he said. According to her father, Pratima had asked her coaches to send her back to India, but they apparently paid no attention saying if she was so confident of competing with Malleshwari, she should be prepared to face the consequences. “My daughter has been made a guinea pig,” he said. Pratima was not aware of the nature of medicines and injections administered, he alleged.

Originally hailing from Kulharia of Bhojpur (Bihar), Pratima graduated from Bokaro Mahila College.

In 1999, Pratima defeated Malleshwari in the senior weight category and was placed fourth in world weightlifting championship held at Beijing (China).

“We are sorry for Pratima but we feel that she is to be blamed. Though an ambitious girl, she was never honest about her sport and she has paid the price,” said T.D. Roy, honorary general secretary of Jharkhand Weightlifting Association. Officials scoffed at Pratima’s allegations against her coaches. “How can she point fingers at her coaches. She should know that unless a player is ready to take drugs, no coach or official on the team can forced the sportsperson to take banned substance,” said Roy.

An official said though Pratima was born and brought up in Bokaro and had received Rs 10 lakh as motivation money from the state government just before the Hyderabad National Games, she refused to represent the state. “She kept on insisting that she would represent Haryana as she was training there. However, after repeated requests by the JOA, she agreed to represent Jharkhand, but returned empty-handed though she had won a gold in the 2002 Commonwealth Games,” sources said.