Building a body, and a dream
Vijayawada’s K. Bala Krishna is on a winning spree, but needs help to keep going
Twenty-three-year-old body builder K. Bala Krishna reached a bit closer to his dream when he recently won the silver medal at the All India Inter University Body Building championship at Pathankot in Punjab. The Vijayawada boy is now looking forward to contesting in Mr Asia, but he needs support.
Bala Krishna, a first year BA student of Sathavahana College in Vijayawada, is the third of five siblings of a very poor family. His father K. Peddiraju is a sanitation worker in the Vijayawada Municipal Corporation.
Due to the family’s dwindling finances, Bala Krishna had to give up studies after Class X. “Then I worked as a sanitation worker in Kanuru near Vijayawada for one-and-a-half years and as a construction worker and painter for one more year,” he says.
But he came back to his city to resume his studies. He says, “My cousin Y. Venkateswara Rao won a silver medal in the All India body building championship. This inspired me, so I got into body building in 2009. To meet the expenses of my practice and diet, I joined a gym as a part-time employee and also worked out there.” Till now he has been named Mr Andhra seven times and Mr Krishna (district) nearly 20 times in the Best Physique category (60 kg).
“The turning point came in 2012 when I won the gold medal in a South India tournament at Tiruvananthapuram and stood fifth in the Mr India competitions in Chennai. But in 2013, I had to discontinue due to problems at home,” he says, adding, “However, in 2014 I resumed practicing with the help of M. Salim, the owner of the gym where I joined as a trainer. He also helped me get the diet needed for a body builder — 30 eggs and 1 kg of chicken a day.”
“Apart from my salary in the gym, I had to borrow `75,000. All this helped me in getting a silver in Pathankot. But the concerned sports bodies didn’t offer me a single penny,” he complains, adding, “Now I wish to participate in the senior nationals to be held in Gujarat next month and win gold. It will entitle me to participate in the Mr Asia championship, which is my dream. But as my finances have dried up, I desperately need help from individuals and sports bodies so that I can concentrate on the sport and bring laurels to the country.”
ASSISTANT TO A DOCTOR
IDEA: Bala Krishna borrowed
75,000 to
` meet the expenses for Pathankot tournament