Hima over the moon after gold feat
Hima Das insists she is “living a dream” after becoming the first Indian to win a sprint gold in athletics at the world level. She became an overnight sensation after winning a 400m gold at the IAAF World U- 20 Championships at Tampere, Finland, on Thursday, joining Neeraj Chopra ( gold in javelin — a field event — in the 2016 edition of the tournament in Poland) to have won gold at the world level.
The previous medal winners at the world junior championships were Seema Punia ( bronze in discus in 2002) and Navjeet Kaur Dhillon ( bronze in discus in 2014).
The 18- year- old, who hails from Kandhulimari village in Assam’s Nagaon district, is the daughter of rice farmer Ronjit and housewife Junali in a family of six. Ronjit was the only bread earner in the family.
“I am living a dream. I am now a world junior champion,” she said.
She is overjoyed at her success, which was even acknowledged by President Ram Nath Kovind and PM Narendra Modi on Friday, but said her focus is just to run fast, which would eventually fetch her medals.
“I don’t go out on the track thinking that I will win a medal. What I think is about running faster and faster and I believe that will translate into medals,” she said.
“I don’t have any target as of now, like I will win a medal in Asian Games or Olympics. I am just happy that I am doing something, bringing laurels to the country.”
Her pace while playing football in a childhood kickabout on a muddy field brought her in attention of a village school teacher, who advised her to take up athletics.
The life- altering decision soon paid dividends as directorate of sports and youth welfare’s athletics coach Nipon Das spotted her in an interdistrict meet late in 2016.
Nipon asked her to shift to Guwahati after convincing her parents of her potential.
She qualified for the Commonwealth Games after winning the 400m gold in Federation Cup in Patiala and finished sixth at the CWG 400m finals.
LINGO CONTROVERSY The Athletics Federation of India was forced to issue a clarification after referring to Hima’s “not so fluent english” following her gold winning effort. “# HimaDas speking to media after her SF win at # iaaftampere2018 @ iaaforg Not so fluent in English but she gave her best there too. So proud of u # HimaDas Keep rocking & yeah, try ur best in final!” the AFI wrote on twitter.
But fans expressed their displeasure against the AFI on social media for being insensitive.