AJAI MASAND
JAKARTA: Self-belief and a desire to do something on the biggest continental stage was the unifying factor as triple-jumper Arpinder Singh, heptathlete Swapna Barman and sprinter Dutee Chand shone in the incandescence of the floodlights at the GBK Main Stadium here on Wednesday.
If one was to look for inspiration, he didn’t have to look beyond a sturdy Sikh, a 21-yearold girl who has overcome debility and a seasoned sprinter who had challenged destiny to emerge champion at the Asian Games.
On a day when Arpinder clinched the triple jump gold, the daughter of a rickshaw driver, Swapna, bagged the top podium finish in the most punishing women’s event and sprinter Dutee Chand overcame cramps to add to the 100m silver, it was the most productive day in track and field, pushing India’s gold medal tally to 11, the same as the 2014 Incheon Asian Games and the total tally to 54, just three short of the previous continental Games.
And with at least five more medals assured — two in boxing, two in squash, and one in women’s hockey — after Wednesday’s performance, India is set to cross the Incheon tally of 57 medals.
Arpinder, who hails from Sonepat in Haryana, was left dehydrated by the extremely sultry conditions, unable to even come close to his personal best of 17.17m set in Lucknow four years back. But his best leap of 16.77m — on the third attempt — was enough for gold as others wilted. The silver-medallist from Uzbekistan, Ruslan Kurbanov, had the best jump of 16.62.
“I started getting cramps because of the conditions after the third jump, which was my best. I was not in a position to even do the fifth and sixth attempts properly and failed,” said Arpinder, the son of an armyman who played kabaddi and wanted his son to take up the more glamorous track events such as 100, 200 and 400m. But Arpinder had made up his mind and he wanted to be a triple jumper.
“After a 16.77m, I wasn’t confident of a medal, leave aside gold, but sometimes luck plays a major role,” said the 25-year-old who became only the third Indian to win a triple jump gold, the others being Mohinder Singh Rai (1958) and Mohinder Singh Gill (1970).
Swapna Barman was an outand-out winner even before she took the field for her last hep-
ARPINDER SINGH, Triple jump gold medallist
tathlon event — the 800m. She only had to finish ahead of China’s Wang Qingling, who was 63 points behind after the sixth and penultimate round of javelin. Though Swapna finished second-last in 800m, she made sure the Chinese finished behind her. Swapna’s total of 6026 was 72 points better that of Qingling.
Swapna’s improvement over the last four years can be gauged from the fact that at the 2014 Incheon Asian Games she had a total of 5178 points.
“I am happy I could achieve this feat despite terrible pain in my right jaw, the result of eating too many chocolates,” the Jalpaiguri girl chuckled.
DUTEE’S DOUBLE
Bhubaneswar girl Dutee Chand could not come up with a similar performance as in the heats, where she timed 23:00 seconds in 200m, but still managed to add to the 100m silver she won on the opening day of athletics. Her timing of 23:20 was way behind Bahrain’s Edidiong Odiong, who clocked 22.96. But the Orissa girl, who has fought many a battle to come back on track, said, “I am finally feeling I am back to where I belong. Bhagwan bahut taqleef diya, leking ab sab theek hai (I went through a lot of hardships, but now everything is OK.”