Khelo India Youth Games: Meet the daughters of labourers who’re champions within the truest sense

Andhra Pradesh’s trio – Rajitha, Pallavi and Sireesha – come from a poor background, however their fierce need to excel in sports activities stole hearts on the Khelo India Youth Games.

Their dad and mom, who’re labourers, have been battling for years to stoke simply the ‘chulas in their tiny hutments. In spite of difficulties, Rajitha sprinted to gold in the Girls 400 metres while Sireesha took bronze behind her. Meanwhile, Pallavi lifted the first gold for Andhra Pradesh in the 64kg category.

Late on Tuesday evening, after a windfall of medals, June Gallyot, the Sports Authority of Andhra Pradesh official, could not hold herself back: “The entire camp got so excited that we partied all through the evening.”

“Each of them has a very sad story to tell. This is poverty at a different level,” June explained. “This is of course not the common strain only in athletics. It’s the identical story in a number of different sports activities.”

The solely redeeming issue is that sports activities is offering gifted women like this trio a platform to overlook their woes for temporary spells, of not depart them behind. Over the previous couple of years, Khelo India Games have found innumerable such motivated gems and offered them succour and scholarship, even serving to a few of them rise to the topmost stage.

Rajitha, belonging to the Koya tribe, misplaced her father at a younger age. Her mom Bhadramma needed to handle 5 youngsters in Ramachandrapuram, a quaint village within the district of East Godavari in Andhra Pradesh.

“She worked as a labourer, morning to night, but still couldn’t earn enough to feed all of us. All of us used to gather dried tree leaves and twigs to kindle our hearths because we couldn’t buy kerosene,” an emotional Rajitha revealed.

“It was a daily fight, to survive. But my mother, like a true warrior, never gave up,” she added.

But then, thankfully, sport got here as a knight in shining armour. Her expertise for operating was noticed by SAAP coaches Vamsi Sai Kiran and Krishna Mohan who honed her expertise. She was then chosen for a Tenvic-SAAP sponsored camp the place she bought the chance to coach beneath Mike Russell.

Rajitha’s life quickly started to alter. She participated in state occasions and began successful medals. Her excessive level got here within the Khelo India Youth Games in Guwahati, the place she gained one other essential medal. She is now a part of the Centre of Excellence and was just lately a member of the Indian relay workforce in Nairobi, asserting her arrival.

She is likely to be coaching beneath Dronacharya coach Nagapuri Ramesh in Hyderabad now, however it’s at her personal expense. “A gentleman named Nagendra donates Rs 10,000 per month to keep me going. I pay 6,000 as house rent and the rest is needed for my food. It is a struggle,” she stated.

Sireesha, from Mandarada village in Srikakulam, is one other story that can deliver tears to anybody. Her father Krishnam Naidu, a labourer, met with a deadly accident in 2019. Since then, her mom Gowri took over the labour work.

“Despite the sudden demise of my father, my mother insisted that I continued my career as an athlete. For a long time, two meals were a luxury for us,’’ Sireesha, who was in tears after winning the bronze medal, revealed.

It was her father who had encouraged Sireesha to take up athletics when she was 14 years. “This is my first medal in the Khelo India Games after a not so good show in the first Khelo Games.”

She thanked her stars that her father had at the least seen her win a gold medal within the Junior National Championships in Tirupati in 2018. “The enjoyment of his eyes made me much more decided to do effectively,” Sireesha, who additionally trains beneath Ramesh in Hyderabad as a SAI Academy trainee, stated.

Eighteen-year-old S Pallavi is one other story of overcome adversity. The women’ 64kg gold medallist in weightlifting is the daughter of a mason labourer in Kondavelagada, Vizianagaram district (Andhra Pradesh). Together, they overcame all the chances, together with her father Laxmi Naidu working additional hours for her daughter’s weight loss plan.

“I can’t inform you what all my father has sacrificed for me. Today, I dedicate this medal in his honour,’’ she stated.