If you are not connected to sports in any manner, you do not ever get an insight into that world. Just like any other complicated and extended activity with many players and spectators, it requires a high degree of management capital to succeed.
Recently, during a trip to Calcutta in the Sealdah Rajdhani Express I had the good fortune to share the Railway cubicle with two world champions in archery from India.
Promila Daimari and Monica Soren behaved like any other teenage girls would except for a few differences. Among their luggage were two large and long trunks which housed their bows and arrows. They were just coming back after participating in the Asia Cup in Taipei.
Monica was from Nayagram village, Medinipur district of Bengal. Promila was from Kokrajhar in Assam. Both had become fast friends with their experiences together.
Monica was a student in Charuchandra college in Kolkata while Promila studied in class XI in Kokrajhar. Both girls appeared tall for Indian teenagers. Their limbs were demurely muscular. It was the constant exercise in the gym before the archery sessions.
I could just imagine both of them letting go of the bowstring and letting the arrow fly with a twang. Monica told me that she was on reserve when the Asia Cup championship happened and that Promila was one of three players who had won a gold medal.
Both girls were very happy but very tired. They had braved a typhoon in Taipei after the tournament and then braved another in Hong Kong where the flight had touched down. “Both airports are right on the sea,” they cried in unison.
They had never seen so much of clean sea water. Monica’s village was miles away from the Bay of Bengal and Promila lived very much in a settlement in landlocked Kokrajhar.
I was so proud to meet this two beautiful Amazonians that I engaged in conversation with them. They told me about the underbelly of the world of sports.
“When I started,” revealed Monica Soren, “I used to be scared. They used to hand over a letter of introduction to me and ask me to reach a coaching camp run by Sports Authority of India at some remote place more than a thousand kilometres away.”
For instance, the camp the two girls inhabited last was in Rohtak just before they went to compete for gold in Taipei. They athletes are in charge of their own transportation.
“Sometimes, my shoulder hurts so much for carrying my own luggage that I wonder how I would shoot an arrow straight when I reach the tournament,” confided Soren.
Meanwhile, Promila refuses to reply to the steward who arrives asking the girls what they want for dinner. Monica intervenes and speaks for both of them. After the steward leaves, Monica explains to the other girl that the food in the Rajdhani Express is free. Promila was afraid to order in the thought that she would be rid of some rupees from her purse at the end of the journey.
The Rajdhani is 70 per cent empty. Owing to Air Asia’s entry, all airlines have cut down ticket prices and most people shun this train which takes 17 hours to complete the journey and opt for a flight which takes just 2 hours.
It was our private train. I enjoyed the conversation I had with these two girls. Promila made a face at the tea the train was serving. She was from Assam – tea country. She had the best at home.
Promila moved between the bunks in the lurching Rajdhani Express like a bronzed fashion model. She was shy owing to her suburban roots. With her hair hair down, her exotic skin, gait like a tribal princess and goat like sure footedness made her look like a likely discovery by a fashion label soon.
The third presence in our cubicle of eight seats but four passengers, Shahana Banerjee, a girl from a township near Asansol in Bengal working in HCL, NOIDA asked our two Amazonians when they began to play this sport of Athena.
“I began during school. Then the Additional District Magistrate pushed my name for inclusion in SAI’s sports coaching camps,” said Soren.
The girls never got any sponsorship. Soren’s request for a new bow was met by the ADM of her district and that is the only support she received.
In fact, the supplies to the coaching camps arrive late as logistics is a topic on the backburner. The girls were handed out 90 tetrapacks of Real juice when they left the camp. They ought to have got three every day instead.
“I am still being supported by my father,” confides Soren. I am getting older and will soon be above the age for government positions. I don’t think any private sector company will hire an archer. We are not good for anything other than winning medals in international competitions.”
“I need a job,” she finishes ruminatively. “I am applying to the Railways, the BSF, the CRPF without luck till now.”
“Neither of us have television at home. Our parents cannot watch us winning medals,” she added.
“As it is it takes more than 40 hours to get home from our Rohtak coaching camp. The last leg is by boat over a stormy river,” she sadly said.
Despite everything, both were determined to continue with their archery. Monica’s WhatsApp status read, “I love archery”.
DISCLAIMER : Views expressed above are the author’s own.