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| An early Indian track and field season is set to start_Pic courtsey G. Rajaraman |
The Commonwealth Games has a quota system for the
first time. For 2018, it is a “hybrid and transitional” model. For 2022, it
would be through a full quota system. The games in Gold Coast in April would be
based on a qualification and
‘’open-entry’’ system.
Athletics, for example, will continue to have an upper
limit of three athletes per event with only the road events (marathon and
racewalking) having minimum entry standards. Yet, the overall numbers per
country would be determined by an allocated quota.
In the new system of quota allocation for the
Commonwealth Games, athletics, at 37, has been sanctioned the maximum number of
entries for India by the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) under its revised
formula, according to a TOI report.
Initially, as per the report, Indian athletics had 30
quota slots but now there are seven more. Strangely, there is also a men-women
break-up prescribed by the CGF, 24 men and 13 women. These numbers look
lop-sided at the moment, keeping in mind the current standards and the
performances four years ago.
3 medals in Glasgow
The last time at Glasgow, the Indian athletics team
was 32-member strong. It returned a tally of one gold (discus thrower Vikas
Gowda), one silver (discus thrower Seema Antil) and one bronze (triple jumper
Arpinder Singh). Around eight to ten medals were projected from the athletics
team on that occasion.
Having had a tough time explaining its selection
process to the courts, the media and the public last year when a few “automatic”
qualifiers (by becoming Asian champions) were excluded from the team to the
World Championships in London, the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) has, for
a change, announced the selection criteria for the Commonwealth and Asian Games
this year in advance.
Unfortunately, while announcing what it termed “qualifying
guidelines” for selection to the Commonwealth and Asian Games, the AFI did not specify the ‘qualification period’. Chief coach Bahadur Singh has since explained the rationale.
As explained in an earlier piece , there is
nothing rigid about AFI’s selection criteria (for want of a better expression,
we will call them ‘selection criteria’). In the past, too, the federation had
announced such norms but when the eventual teams were chosen, there never was
any guarantee that the criteria would be adhered to.
With the Sports Minister apparently keen to have a
sizeable contingent, the AFI might not have to chop and change the
team and we can hope that it would fill up the 37 places offered. How it would
go about it, is to be seen only.
Will all 37 athletes achieve the norms laid down by
the AFI or will there be concessions? If there is concession in one event, can
another athlete in another event be expected to keep quiet? Or will he/she
approach the courts as Kerala’s P. U. Chithra did last year and Anu Raghvan,
also of Kerala, did in the Olympic year?
High criteria
The AFI has kept the CWG criteria high, rather very
high in certain events. For example, the women’s 100m. At 11.15s, it looks
beyond the reach of even Dutee Chand, who, however, is determined to not only
make it to the team but also do her best at the Gold Coast games.
The hitch for Dutee could be not just the criterion
but lack of support from the federation as she put it according to this report
In 17 of the 42 individual events at the games, the
AFI-stipulated guidelines are better than the Indian national records.
The following are these norms (national records within
parenthesis):
Men: 100m 10.16s (10.30s, 10.26s unratified), 200m 20.35s
(20.66s), 400m 45.30s (45.32*), 5000m 13:25.00 (13:29.70), 10,000m 28: 00.00
(28:02.89), 3000m steeplechase 8:20.00 (8:30.88), 400m hurdles 49.45s (49.51s),
pole vault 5.45m (5.14m*), hammer 71.00m (70.73*), decathlon 8000 (7658).
Women: 100m 11.15s (11.30s, 11.24s unratified), 200m
22.60s (22.82s), 5000m 15:09.00 (15:15.89), marathon 2:30:14 (2:34:43), 100m
hurdles 13.05s (13.38), hammer 68.72m (65.25*), javelin 62.50m (61.86m).
(* denotes yet-to-be-ratified performances)
In at least two other men’s events the targets may
prove to be stiffer than others, the 1:46.00 in the 800m and the 2:12:50 in men's marathon.
Apart from Sriram Singh who clocked 1:45.77 in the
Montreal Olympics final in 1976, the only other Indian athlete to clock a
sub-1:46 in the 800m is Jinson Johnson who timed 1:45.98 in Bengaluru to make
the grade for the Rio Olympic Games. All others have timings above 1:46 in the
all-time lists. Johnson’s second best (1:46.43) is also below the CWG standard.
There is no one close to late Shivnath Singh’s 1978
marathon timing of 2:12:00. Thonakal Gopi (2:15:25) who could be a contender
for the CWG slot, irrespective of his timings, and Kheta Ram (2:15.26) are the
next best.
In several other events, too, the task for the Indian
athletes look a lot tougher than that could have been the case had the CWG come
later in the season rather than in April. To once peak in March and then again
towards July the same year for the Asian Games is a daunting task, though our
athletes are not totally unfamiliar with such double ‘periodisation’.
May prefer Asian Games
Many of the leading athletes may find it more
profitable to concentrate on their Asian Games preparations than strain
themselves in aiming for the stiff CWG marks. A medal in the Asian Games is
easier to achieve than in the CWG in a majority of the events for Indian
athletes.
The personal bests of some of the active athletes and
the AFI guidelines for the CWG are listed below just to provide an idea about the
tough task that awaits the Commonwealth Games aspirants:
Men: 100m-criterion 10.16s (Amiya Mallick 10.26s, V.
K. Elakiyadasan 10.31), 200m-20.35s (Elakiyadasan 20.92s), 5000m-13:25.00 (G.
Lakshmanan 13:35.69), 10,000m-28:00.00 (G. Lakshmanan 29:16.21), 3000m
steeplechase-8:20.00 (Avinash Sable 8:39.81), Pole vault-5.45m (S. Siva 5.14m),
Decathlon-8000 points (Abhishek Shetty 6991).
Women: 100m-11.15s (Dutee Chand 11.30s, also a
‘doubtful’ 11.24s in Almaty in 2016), 200m-22.60s (Srabani Nanda 23.34s),
1500m-4:10.00 (P. U. Chithra 4:17.92), 5000m-15:09.00 (L. Suriya 15:39.18),
10,000m-32:30.00 (Sanjivani Jadhav 33:14.16), 100m hurdles-13.05s (Purnima
Hembram 13.72s), 400m hurdles-56.00s (Anu Raghavan 57.21s), triple jump-13.90m
(N. V. Sheena 13.58m), shot put-17.00m (Navjeet Kaur Dhillon 15.89m), hammer-68.72m
(Sarita Prakash 65.25m).
There are others who look capable of achieving these
criteria, given the fact that they have either been consistent around such
marks or achieved comparable or better marks last year. They include (with
marks in 2017):
Men: 400m-45.30s (Muhammed Anas 45.32s), 110m hurdles-13.55s
(Siddhanth Thingalaya 13.48s), high jump-2.25m (Tejaswin Shankar 2.26m), Long
jump-8.00m (Ankit Sharma 7.96m), triple jump-16.60m (Arpinder Singh 16.75m),
shot put-20.20m (Tejinder Pal Singh Toor 20.40m), discus-62.00m (Vikas Gowda
62.35m)
Women: 400m-52.00s (Nirmala Sheoran 51.28s, Jisna Mathew 52.65s, M. R. Poovamma 52.66s), Pole vault-4.00m (Vakharia Khyati 4.10m), high jump-1.90m (Swapna Barman 1.87m), long jump-6.45m
(V. Neena 6.54m, Nayana James 6.55m), Heptathlon-5826 (Swapna Braman 5942,
Purnima Hembram 5798).
It is not clear at this point whether the Union Sports
Ministry would stick to the sixth-place criteria it announced for
multi-discipline games in 2015. Except for that in the men’s 5000m (sixth place
13:22.32 as against AFI norm of 13:25.00), all other marks fixed by the AFI for CWG are
better than the sixth-place result of the Glasgow Commonwealth Games. In fact,
in many events, if the sixth-place criteria were to be applied then there could
be more qualifiers than the AFI would be able to accommodate!
Tough to fill up 24 places
Hopefully, the AFI would stick to its guidelines
especially after the uproar that the Chithra exclusion caused at the time of
the London World championships. Filling up 24 places in the men’s section might
be difficult, though, unless the AFI is planning to enter both the relay teams.
The men’s 4x100m guideline has been pegged at 38.35s (fourth
place of 2014 games) which is better than the national record of 38.89s that India
clocked at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in New Delhi for a surprise bronze. The
best by an Indian team in recent times has been the 39.86s that it clocked in
Almaty in 2016. The norms in the men and women’s 4x400m, 3:02.17 and 3:32.45 respectively,
should be attainable.
Javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra, one should presume, has
already clinched his place in the Gold Coast-bound team with his performance of
82.80m at Offenburg, Germany, on Feb 3. The selection criterion is 81.80m. He
seems to have stuck to his German base, at least for the time being, instead of
coming under the guidance of former world record holder Uwe Hohn who is in
India.
Talking of javelin, it is disturbing to note that
Devender Singh Kang, who was the lone Indian athlete to make the final at last
year’s World Championships, hit a ‘low’ with an effort of 75.87 (gold) at the
Asian Games test event at Jakarta this month. Kang had registered a personal
best 84.57m at Patiala last year when he also had six other marks over 80
metres. Kang is currently facing an anti-doping rule violation charge though he
has not been provisionally suspended which is the case with national women’s
shot put record-holder Manpreet Kaur.
Racewalkers selected
The AFI has named four racewalkers for the
Commonwealth Games after the National championships in New Delhi. National
record holder K. T. Irfan and Rio Olympian Manish Singh Rawat in the men’s
20km, the new national champion Baby Soumya and former national record holder
and the most experienced woman walker Khushbir Kaur in the women’s 20km have gained
selection. All of them easily surpassed the AFI guidelines.
Soumya’s improvement from a 1:41 walker to a 1:31
walker is significant. If the Kerala woman maintains form she, along with
Khushbir, should be among the medal contenders in Gold Coast.
Indian athletes will have only limited opportunities
to make the cut for the Commonwealth Games. The first one comes in the form of
the Indian Grand Prix at Patiala on Feb 27. Then there will be the Federation
Cup from March 5 to 8. That will be the final ‘selection trials’ for the
Commonwealth Games. As in the past, the federation is making it mandatory for
athletes to compete in the Fed Cup to gain selection. Those who have achieved
the guidelines would be expected to maintain their form close to those marks
during the meet. At least on paper, that is the argument. It need not always
materialize that way.
Sometime ago, the AFI had held out the threat that
those who stayed away from camps would not be eligible to compete in the
‘selection trials’. It is to be seen whether this remains just a threat or not.
The 2016 season produced some stunning performances
just in time to make the qualification for the Rio Olympics. We know what
happened afterwards. It is to be hoped the Rio Olympic qualification race or
even the 2017 World Championships one will not be repeated in attempting to
make the Gold Coast cut. One also expects the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) to do a thorough job of monitoring the performance of the athletes getting ready for the two games this season. Keeping away from championships, as NADA did last season, will prove disastrous. Inflated performances at home invariably get exposed on the bigger stage.
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