Thursday, Apr 04, 2002
Thursday, Apr 04, 2002 |
| Sport | ||
|
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Miscellaneous |
Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary | Sport
-
Athletics
By K.P. Mohan
But wait, the AAFI has not ratified any record for the past two years. And those two years have produced as many as 25 National records, 18 of them in the year 2000. All of them had been left unratified just because the federation just could not decide whether to approve a batch of records set in 2000 that raised doubts in the minds of the followers of the sport. Mercifully, the AAFI has decided to take up the matter all over again at its Executive Committee meeting here on Thursday. Once again the focus will be on a set of records established in Bangalore on July 5, 2000. These records, including the 20.60 metres by Shakti Singh in shot put, have been the most contentious ones ever since they were set. They continue to be the topic of interesting debate in athletics circles. The policy-makers in the federation, who will also be discussing several other topics including the preparation of the teams for this year's Asian Games, Commonwealth Games and the Asian championships, cannot be expected to spend too much of their time in deciding about which record to ratify and which one not to. Obviously they will go by what the technical committee members have to say and, in at least one instance, the opinion of a special panel set up at Lucknow last September when Gurpreet Singh bettered a 37-year-old record by clocking 14.07s for the 110m hurdles. Gurbachan Singh Randhawa, the man who lost that record in Lucknow, one of India's finest athletes ever, was quick to congratulate Gurpreet for his memorable feat and even predicted that the Punjab lad would be the first Indian to break the 14-second barrier. Yet, Randhawa has not been totally convinced by the explanations given so far about his 1964 Tokyo Olympics time of 14.0s being treated as 14.09s. He still maintains that his timing, as recorded in the official Olympic statistical compilations continues to be 14.0 and as such the 14.07 clocked by Gurpreet cannot be considered as better. No one will argue that Randhawa's Tokyo timing was not 14.0s. It certainly was. The argument is about how that 14.0 became 14.09, how a seemingly `manual' timing became an `electronic' one. It has been explained before, but for the sake of those who might still be unaware, here is the gist of the explanation: In Olympics, till 1964, official timing was manual. In 1964 and 1968, official times were rounded up or down from an `automatic' time which subsequently was also accepted as the electronic-equivalent after adjusting it by adding 0.05s to account for the in-built delay in timing equipment of that period. Though the official timings were listed only up to a tenth of a second, the automatic timings listed within parenthesis in all compilations of the International Association of Athletic Federations (IAAF) were up to a hundredth of a second. Randhawa's actual timing in the final in Tokyo was 14.04s. To it was added 0.05 and the figure 14.09 was arrived at. It was done in the case of all the athletes in all the track events and some of them, besides Randhawa, found their way into the National record books of their respective countries. "...I only know that there are no doubts about 14.09 as the `subsequently official time' and in the same way there are no doubts for me that the new Indian NR is now 14.07 seconds...'' wrote Mr. Heinrich Hubbeling, a member of the Association of Track and Field Statisticians (ATFS) from Germany who compiles the annual Asian rankings and who is also the co-author of the IAAF list of National records of all countries along with Mr. Winfried Kramer. Mr. Hubbeling explained last November, on a query from this correspondent, that all these `subsequently' automatic times were accepted world-wide and in all statistical publications of the IAAF. Randhawa differs. His argument is that as long as the official results show him at 14.0s, nothing could ever be changed. His is a similar argument to the one made by Milkha Singh in 1998 when Paramjeet Singh clocked a 45.73s in Calcutta to better the great man's 1960 Rome effort. Milkha's official time for his fourth place in Rome was 45.6 while an `automatic time', later accepted world-wide, put it at 45.73. Paramjeet has since clocked a 45.56 to end much of the argument, though he is still to come near 45.70 in competitions abroad, a condition that Milkha keeps harping about. It might not be possible to convince either Randhawa or Milkha. But Randhawa is convinced that without completing dope-testing, no National record should ever be ratified. He was the dissenting voice in a two-member panel (the other member being Mr. S. P. Pillai of Kerala) that last year went into the issue of ratifying records set in 2000. After having initially agreed in writing that the records could be approved, Randhawa, at a meeting in Bangalore last June, took the stand that without dope-testing such records should not be cleared. Caught in a most awkward situation, the AAFI Executive decided to form another panel, this time a three-member one. That committee was never set up and now the matter, after having been discussed among technical officials, will go directly to the Executive. If the dope-testing argument is stuck to, irrespective of the fact that there was no such ruling in the year 2000, the records that are likely to face the Executive's axe are: 10.21s by Anil Kumar in 100m, 20.60m by Shakti Singh in shot put, 11.26s by Rachita Mistry in women's 100m and 23.04s by Vinita Tripathi in women's 200m. All the above marks were achieved in Bangalore on July 5, 2000 when there was no dope control in place. P. T. Usha, the best Indian woman athlete the world has known, had quite rightly argued after the Bangalore meet that unless dope-testing was made mandatory, at least for record-setters, Indian athletics will lack credibility. She, in fact wrote to the Union Sports Minister and the AAFI Secretary, and received letters from the Sports Authority of India (SAI) and the federation that nothing would be done towards ratifying records without following certain procedures. Usha held the records in the 100m at 11.39 (equalled by Rachita in the 2000 Federation Cup at Lucknow) and the 200m at 23.25s. Many wondered whether Usha was just trying to cling onto her records by pointing an accusing finger at younger athletes while India's most bemedalled athlete felt that nothing would be achieved by projecting a healthy picture of Indian athletics just by showing the National marks. The worst fears came true at the Sydney Olympics. If it is agreed that in a subsequent meet at Chennai, after the Bangalore meet of July 5, 2000, dope control was in place, then Rachita Mistry's 23.10s for the 200 could be approved as the new National record, replacing Usha's 23.25s. Likewise, Shakti's 20.42 at Chennai, during the inter-State, is likely to get the nod. In Shakti's case, if his 20.42m is accepted, the Asian Amateur Athletic Association (AAAA) of which the AAFI chief Mr Suresh Kalmadi is the president, will be hard put to hide its embarrassment. For, Shakti's 20.60 has already been listed as the Asian record. It is going to be a ticklish question for the AAFI. It has to protect its credibility and that of Indian athletics as a whole. At the same time, it also has to look convincing after having waited for two years to ratify a few records.
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Miscellaneous |
|
|
|
The Hindu Group: Home | About Us | Copyright | Archives | Contacts | Subscription Group Sites: The Hindu | Business Line | The Sportstar | Frontline | Home |
Copyright © 2002, The
Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of
this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of
The Hindu
|