National Games: Stunning show, some worries too

Top performances by Aishwarya Mishra and Sachin Yadav at National Games raise questions about Indian athletics.

Two performances, quartermiler Aishwarya Mishra’s 51.12s and javelin thrower Sachin Yadav’s 84.39m which figure among top five in India’s all-time list, stood out in athletics at the 38th National Games which wound up here on Friday.

While javelin throwers have often produced big season-openers – World champion Neeraj Chopra started with over 88m throws in the last three years though he begins only by May – no Indian quartermiler has started the way Aishwarya has.

“I was in a sort of trance for some five to 10 minutes when I saw the time,” said Aishwarya. “If everything goes well, I’m hoping to do a national record this year.”

Even Hima Das, the National record-holder with 50.79s (2018 Jakarta Asian Games) only opened that year with 53.21s. And Aishwarya started last year with 54.51s in mid-March.

Incidentally, the last time Aishwarya came close to this impressive time – with 51.18s at the 2022 Federation Cup – she went incommunicado for more than a month after that. Even the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) had no clue about her whereabouts then.

In this scenario, is the national federation happy or worried with the National Games performances?

“I think there are good performances so it is a good sign that people are improving overall,” World Athletics vice-president Adille Sumariwalla who is also the AFI spokesperson, told The Hindu here.