Gold for India but no national flag, anthem

Indians have been barred from participating in indoor meets too

Vinayak Padmadeo

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, November 27

Abhishek Verma and Jyothi Surekha Vennam should feel nothing but great pride after becoming the only pair to stop the mighty South Koreans from winning all the gold medals at the Asian Archery Championships. Yet, Verma sounded hurt when we called him.

The Koreans won nine out of 10 available gold medals at the event, but Verma and Jyothi took gold by beating Chinese Taipei’s Yi-Hsuan Chen and Chieh-Lun Chen 158-151 in the mixed compound team event. The Indian pair had beaten the South Korean team 159-154 in the semifinals.

But the Indian pair could not hear the national anthem at the medal ceremony — they were introduced as Olympic Athletes because the Archery Association of India is derecognised due to factionalism. Thus, neither the national flag was unfurled nor was the national anthem played as they received their medals.

Felt bad

“We can’t do anything in this scenario… Rather we should be thankful that they allowed us to compete,” Verma told The Tribune from Bangkok “I felt bad as we were not allowed to display India colours. It is a sad feeling that despite winning, our national flag was not unfurled. Even our competitors were surprised when the anthem was not played. I want to request everybody to get this fight over and done with because we are archers are the ones who are suffering.”

Later in the day, the 30-year-old Verma joined hands with Rajat Chauhan and Mohan Bhardwaj to win a silver medal in the men’s compound team event. The team felt short by a point as they lost 232-233 against the South Koreans.

“Ours was only gold (mixed team) that was won by a non-Korean team. It was windy today and despite that we scored 158 to win. But slightly disappointed that we lost the team medal against Korea, and that too with a close score,” he said.

Barred from indoors

But an innocuous query about which tournaments he would be participating in next has Verma worried. Archery’s governing body, World Archery, has barred Indian archers from competing in indoor tournaments. So Verma and the others don’t have any clue about which tournaments they will be participating in next. Verma had booked tickets for Truball/Axcel Roma Trophy, to be held in Italy next month, and was also planning to take part in the Indoor World Series in Las Vegas in February 2020. But now he will be cooling his heels at home, hoping for good news.

“This (derecognition) has started to impact our archery. The World Archery chief (Tom Dielin) told me that I can’t participate. Also, the Nationals are not being held and there are no tournaments to look forward to,” the ace archer said.

“I really don’t have an answer on whether to continue training,” he added. “We are all confused. I think I will take a holiday. Our only hope is that the federation gets recognised soon and they (World Archery) allow us to take part as individuals.”