Pratima Kumari says she arrived in India on the evening of August 16 after being sent home in disgrace from Athens and hid at the Indira Gandhi International Airport for a day-and-a-half.
She says she was too scared to face her relatives and neighbours. She said she did not eat a morsel for two days.
Just before she left for the Olympics, she was feted by a plethora of top-ranking sports officials. When she came back, she was alone in her disgrace, despite the fact that those same officials were probably involved in her disgrace (coaches and possibly administrators) and the attempted cover-up (administrators).
Everyone knows that doping in India is an almost systematic exercise. Yet, it is a system that only hangs the athlete if he or she is caught cheating. Everyone else just enjoys the hanging.
Pratima's story (and there are countless others) is another example of the ruthless face of India's sports officialdom. If you do well, they take the plaudits with you. If you are stigmatised, you stand alone.
Pratima says what bothered her most was that when the news of her testing positive was broken to her at 10 pm on August 15, she was asked to pack her bags immediately.
{{/usCountry}}Pratima says what bothered her most was that when the news of her testing positive was broken to her at 10 pm on August 15, she was asked to pack her bags immediately.
{{/usCountry}}"Coach (Pal Singh) Sandhu did not even see me eye to eye. He just left saying he was hungry and wanted to eat dinner. It's terrible, they asked me to leave the Village on my own and finally at 2:30 am (Deputy Chef-de-Mission of the Indian contingent) Harish Sharma dropped me at the airport."
Pratima decided to come out of hiding after the news of her positive test for testosterone became public. She says she is haunted like never before.
"I am not a cheat, please," she wailed. "This whole thing is a conspiracy hatched by Belarussian coach Leonid Taranenko in collusion with National coach Pal Singh Sandhu."
She said the pre-Athens training camp in Belarus was a sham. "We do not know why we were taken to a place where training facilities were pathetic. Patiala and Bangalore are much better.
“And when I had pain above my hip and an MRI was done in Minsk, they said I had damaged my disc. The injections they gave me in the spine only aggravated my pain. After that, I was given 20 intra-muscular injections, which had Russian labels," she said.
"I am aware of banned substances, and have never used drugs. Taranenko and Sandhu have ruined my career and I am convinced these painful injections were all wrong. Taranenko's idea was to make sure I flopped so that his country's lifter could win a medal in the same weight category," added Pratima.
Even when she was in Belarus and her pain got worse, she called India.
"But Indian Weightlifting Federation (IWF) secretary Balbir Bhatia was not keen I return and Pal Singh Sandhu said he would not let me go. I hope these people are exposed. I swear by God, they can subject me to any medical test and I can prove my innocence. Don't hang me without a trial," she pleaded.
She said that an MRI done on her return to India showed no disc damage but a ligament tear. "It is clear they (Taranenko, Sandhu and the Russian doctor) played havoc with me in Belarus. I will fight it out and expose them. Sadly, all this is happening at a time when everyone will forget my achievements and my dream of getting the Arjuna Award will be botched."
No one says Pratima Kumari is innocent. She’s guilty. But, by all accounts, so is India's sports officialdom.
The quite scandalous Indian Weightlifting Federation, whose head is sitting pretty in Athens even now, the IOA and Sports Authority of India, who cleared her to go to the Olympics and the Sports Ministry, that does not have either the inclination or the gumption to effect change, despite a number of scandals these past years.