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Gymnast Dipa Karmakar seeks clarity over likely Asian Games snub
The country’s best gymnast is dejected that a late rule brought in by Sports Authority of India could dash her Games hopes.
Dipa Karmakar is confused. A little over a month after topping the selection trials for next month’s Hangzhou Asian Games, the trailblazing gymnast finds herself out of the reckoning. “The worst part is, there are no answers. No clarity whatsoever,” she said.
On Tuesday, the 30-year-old from Agartala, in a series of tweets, called recent developments related to the gymnastics squad for the Asian Games “demotivating and discouraging”.
“I was really looking forward to the Asian Games. The period of (doping) ban was a dark chapter in my life and I was looking to move on with the Asiad, but these developments have left me distraught and thoroughly confused,” said Karmakar, who won nationwide praise after her impressive fourth-place finish at the 2016 Rio Olympics, when contacted.
Karmakar, on a comeback after a 21-month doping ban, had looked forward to her fourth Asian Games. Gymnastics Federation of India (GFI) held the selection trials on July 11 and 12 in Bhubaneswar. Karmakar scored 47.05 points in the individual all-round competition to finish well ahead of her nearest competitor Pranati Das (45.80).
While she thought her selection was assured, confusion arose after sports ministry sent fresh selection criterion to GFI a day before the trials. For individual events, it said, “during the last 12 months prior to the commencement of the event, the performance of the sportspersons should not be less than the performance achieved by the eighth position holder of the 2018 Asian Games.” HT has a copy of the said selection criterion.
The individual all-round score of the eighth-placed gymnast — South Korea’s Yeo Seo-Jeong — at the 2018 Asiad was 49.900. Karmakar’s ban in October, 2021 meant she had not competed since the 2019 World Cup in Baku.
“What was the point of conducting those trials if I was not eligible to begin with? There has been no communication from SAI or the sports ministry,” she said.
GFI also did not inform Dipa or her coach Bisweshwar Nandi about the SAI directive. “Had I been told, I probably wouldn’t have let her compete in the trials because there was no point. I am part of GFI’s technical committee, yet I was never told,” Nandi said.
“In my long career as a coach, this is the only time when past performance is being considered for selection. Gymnastics is a technical sport and past performances do not matter. It looks like someone with no understanding of the sport has drafted the criterion. Such practices are arbitrary and will spell disaster for gymnastics in India,” he added.
GFI president Sudhir Mittal said: “Dipa or her coach were not informed because in our mind we thought the trials will be considered a tournament whose scores will count towards selection. The only way Dipa could’ve made it to the team was by doing well in the trials. SAI’s criterion shouldn’t have applied to her, to begin with.”
GFI forwarded the names of five men and four women after the trials, but only Pranati Nayak has reportedly made the cut. India’s official participation list is yet to be released. Nayak didn’t participate in the trials. “I think she was informed about the criterion, so she rightly saw no point in competing in the trials,” Nandi said.
“It’s a grave setback,” Karmakar said. “I try to busy myself with training, but I can’t give 100 percent. When I came to know about the new criterion, I wrote to SAI seeking relaxation, but I’m yet to get a reply. I’ve still not given up. I’m waiting for a miracle.”
