Internet Desk: Indian woman marathon runner O P Jaisha has alleged that during the race she wasn’t provided personal refreshment at water stations, which resulted in her being completely drained and dishing out a poor performance after the race. However, controversy has been raised after her unwillingness to run in marathon.
“Running that distance, in that heat, you need so much water. There is a common water point after 8 km, but you need water after each kilometre. Other athletes were getting food along the way. I got nothing. And I could not see a single Indian flag. We love the flag so much. It gives us such energy,” she complained.
Jaisha placed 89 of a total of 157 competitors. She collapsed after she finished the 42-km race. “I seemed to have no pulse,” she said. “This is like my second life.” She said while she was struggling, Indian officials had no idea about her condition. “After three hours, they came looking for me to the medical centre,” the 33-year-old said.
After her complaint controversy has been raised over her joining the Rio squad. There was disagreement over qualification for Rio as well. Lalita Babar, Sudha Singh and Jaisha had all qualified for the marathon, but were reluctant to run the event in Rio. “I want to qualify for 1500m or 5,000m,” Jaisha had said in April. She, however, wasn’t given that opportunity by the coach, although she did not speak out then.
After all these controversies, Indian government came forward. Union sports minister Vijay Goel said, “IOA takes of these things. I will look into matter. I didn’t call this a minor incident, but sometimes Sports Ministry is not directly involved in a lot of things.”