Youth Olympics : Praveen Chitravel, Farm Labourer's Son Wins Bronze In Triple Jump
Buenos Aires, Oct 17 : Praveen Chitravel, a farm labourer's son from Tamil Nadu, clinched a bronze medal in the men's triple jump to give India its second athletics medal in the ongoing Youth Olympics here.
The 17-year-old Praveen, who hails from a village in Thanjavur district, cleared a distance of 15.68m to finish fifth in the Stage 2 competition Tuesday night but his good showing in Stage 1, where he was third with a jump of 15.84m, took him to the podium with a combined effort of 31.52m.
In a new format, there are no finals in track and field, except for the 4km cross-country, in the Youth Olympics and each event is held twice, with results from both rounds counting towards the final standings.
Alejandro Diaz of Cuba won the gold with a combined effort of 34.18m (17.14m + 17.04m) while Emmeanuel Oritsemeyiwa (16.34m + 15.51m) of Nigeria took the silver.
This was India's second athletics medal in the ongoing Games after Suraj Panwar clinched a silver in the men's 5000m race walk event on Monday.
Praveen, a gold medallist in the inaugural Khelo India School Games this year, belongs to an extremely poor family in a small village in Thanjavur district in Tamil Nadu and his father is a daily wage farm labourer.
Praveen luckily met a mentor in Indira Suresh, an athletics coach at the Centre of Excellence for Boys in Chennai who is an employee of the Sports Development Authority of India, and she groomed him. He now trains under Indira at Nagercoil.
"When Praveen was in Class VII at the CoE in Chennai, I spotted him and took him under me. When I was shifted to a college in Nagecoil, he also came to me and said he will train only under me. So, I got him admitted to my college," Indira told PTI on Wednesday.
"Not even Praveen, his younger bother also is training under me now.
"He is from a very poor family in Thanjavur district, his father is a daily wage farm labourer and his mother is a housewife. He has an elder sister and a younger brother. His father's meagre income cannot support the cost of his training," she added.
Praveen won a silver medal in the Junior National Championships in Coimbatore this year and Indira feels that he has the potential to reach the highest level and compete in the Asian Games, Commonwealth Games and Olympics in future.
"Praveen has the talent and he is very hardworking. He rarely goes home, and so his father comes to meet him. I want to groom him as a national champion and then represent the country in the Asian Games and the Olympics," she said.
He now studies B.A. first year at a college in Mangalore in Karnataka under the sports quota but still trains at Nagercoil.
"Praveen goes to Mangalore only to appear for examinations as he gets exemption from the college to train at Nagercoil with me. He was earlier in the national camp briefly.
"He gets some stipends and with some financial support from others, I am supporting him in his training, participation in competitions etc. His family has no money to support him in his athletics career," the coach said.
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Confident we are going to win Kerala: Shashi Tharoor
New Delhi (PTI): Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Thursday expressed confidence in the victory of the United Democratic Front (UDF) in Kerala, saying the Congress-led alliance will win more than 75 seats out of the total 140 in the state.
Tharoor, who hails from Kerala, said he was not surprised to see the results of the exit polls, most of which predicted a victory for the UDF that has been out of power for 10 years in the state.
"We have been on the ground. I have campaigned in 59 constituencies across 12 districts out of 14. I was very confident we are going to win.
"Everything that I have picked up from not just my party colleagues and workers but also from other observers, media and others have always convinced me that we were going to score a comfortable win of above 75 seats. And all the (exit) polls have confirmed the same thing," he told reporters here.
The Thiruvananthapuram MP said he was not surprised to see the results of the exit polls but in general he was not a big fan of exit polls in India.
"Because ours is not purely a homogenous society. We have to take into account gender issue, caste issue, class issue, regional disparities. You never get a convincingly large enough sample to give an accurate poll and now there is the additional complication that we have heard about in West Bengal this year that many people are unwilling to answer the questions of the pollsters," he said.
The Congress leader said normally, it used to be below 10 per cent that people said that they would not answer.
"Even if you are a reputable exit pollster, in Bengal, one polling company has said 60 per cent of people refused to answer. So, what is the worth of a poll where 60 per cent of your respondents have not answered," he said.
Several exit polls on Wednesday predicted a comeback by the Congress-led UDF in Kerala after 10 years, dethroning the CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF).
Polling for the 140-member Kerala assembly was held on April 9. Results of assembly elections in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Assam, Puducherry, besides Kerala, will be announced on May 4.
