‘It was not only sexual abuse, it was also verbal and mental abuse’

After a 19-year-old national-level runner filed a sexual harassment grievance in opposition to Chennai-based athletics coach P Nagarajan in May, seven extra girls athletes, amongst them India internationals, got here ahead with related allegations in opposition to the 59-year-old, The Indian Express had reported.
All the complainants, a few of them lengthy retired, had educated as juniors with Nagarajan, and the abuse is alleged to have occurred over a number of years.
Nagarajan is credited with mentoring a number of nationwide medallists over three many years. The coach is going through fees beneath the IPC and Protection Of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. The victims gave statements to a Justice of the Peace. Last month, the police filed a cost sheet. The Indian Express spoke to 2 victims who’re adults now.
Asking them to come back for private teaching, isolating them from the remainder of the group after which touching them inappropriately throughout therapeutic massage when no person was round is how two former worldwide athletes recall among the sexual abuse by coach P Nagarajan once they have been youngsters.

One athlete, a nationwide junior report holder in her time, stated being an introvert she was afraid to speak again to the coach. The different athlete tried to commit suicide as a teen and had nervous breakdowns. Now in her late 30s, she says she has struggled with intimacy, forming relationships and located it arduous to belief older males ever since.
The Indian Express spoke to the 2 athletes individually. They have been coached by Nagarajan throughout completely different time durations. They have each given their assertion to a Justice of the Peace.
If the athletes tried to depart early earlier than a therapeutic massage session by the coach, they’d both get the chilly shoulder for the following few days or he would begin a character-assassination marketing campaign in opposition to them within the academy.
“I broke the Under-16 national record. That is when the sexual abuse started. He used to say ‘you have to stay back after practice so you can train more’. If I had knee pain, he would say ‘I will relieve the pain’. He used to touch my private parts, I felt really uncomfortable. I did not tell my mother as it would affect her. The first time it happened, I was 15,” alleged the athlete who was coached by Nagarajan for over 10 years.
The athlete didn’t know say ‘no’ as a result of she was afraid of the coach. She had initially regarded as much as him due to his monitor report of manufacturing champions. “He used to tell me ‘I will help you stretch’, and he started to put his hands on me. He would make me sit on his lap. He told me that ‘I am like a father’. At that age I did not know how to react. Now they are teaching children what is a ‘good touch’ and a ‘bad touch’ but at that time I never knew. I used to run away from the ground at the end of training. I was afraid to even talk back to him.”

This athlete joined the membership when she was 10 years previous and alleges the sexual abuse began a number of years later and went on for 4 years.
“The abuse increased year-by-year. He told me to be intimate like a husband and wife are. My parents, because I was doing well in sports, thought he was like a God. When I told my parents about him, he told them, ‘your daughter’s behaviour is not good. She is talking to boys’. If you told my parents about their daughter talking to a boy, it would be a big issue. In my family even having a friend who was a boy was unacceptable,” the athlete stated. The coach additionally restricted her interactions with the surface world and monitored who she spoke to. “He did not allow me to talk to the media. I did not have a mobile phone, so whoever called had to talk through my father or through him.”
Threat to tarnish identify
The first time the athlete gathered braveness to confront the coach, he threatened he would tarnish her repute. “I went and told Nagarajan, ‘if you continue the sexual abuse, I will report it to the media’. At that time I was performing well. He threatened me saying ‘I will also tell people that you are also cooperating’. I started crying.”
Eventually, when she determined to depart the membership, the coach requested for forgiveness.
“That time he fell and touched my feet. He hit himself with a slipper and I also hit him with the same slipper. After that the sexual abuse stopped (in 2011). I thought that I was the only one being abused by the coach.” The allegations in opposition to the coach first appeared in a tweet on May 26 carrying nameless testimonies of the alleged victims.
Soon after the tweets have been printed, Nagarajan known as this specific athlete to inform her to defend him if the scandal blew up.
She hadn’t seen the tweets earlier than the coach introduced it to her discover. Once she put the cellphone down, she determined to talk up.
“I had no plan to get back at him because he is so influential. If I stood alone against him, he would make me nothing. I had told my parents about this earlier but they did not believe it initially. When this issue came out (allegation of sexual abuse against the coach) my parents were worried if I would go talk to media or police. Imagine, my parents are afraid though the abuse happened 15 years back.”
The second athlete this paper spoke to says she was in seventh grade when she joined a faculty the place Nagarajan coached. Within a yr, she grew to become a sufferer of sexual abuse. “When I was in 8th grade, Nagarajan said ‘I want you to improve your long jump technique so could you come an hour before everybody’. So if everybody got there at 4pm, I would get there at 3. So one such time, the sexual abuse started when I was alone with him. I didn’t know what to make of it, I was ashamed, I was shocked and I could not even process it,” the athlete says.
To keep away from being alone with the coach, the athlete would ask a pal to additionally come early. They would play basketball and wait until the opposite athletes got here to the bottom. But she says, the coach discovered a technique to get time along with her alone.

“Once I began avoiding him, he advised my mother and father that he would take me to the YMCA for particular health checks. He took me to his room within the YMCA.
He stated there’s this new therapeutic massage approach in Western international locations which helps you get well quick. When this occurred I used to be devastated. I assumed that this is able to occur solely in class. It continued until twelfth grade. It was not solely the sexual abuse it was additionally verbal and psychological abuse. Because of the abuse I’ve had issues with intimacy, with forming relationships, and in trusting older males.” The coach discovered it simpler when he moved the academy from the varsity to a medical school floor.
“As it was at a medical school, nobody came to use the grounds. He could continue with the physical abuse. Despite all this I went to represent India at the Asia level. I would have nervous breakdowns. My mom thought I was upset because I was working hard. I had tried to commit suicide.”
This athlete additionally thought she was the one one being abused however heard of comparable experiences from others as soon as she left the academy.