Page 16 - Sportability

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आप सभी परयावलक्पिक को सपोर कीवजय और हम आनियाल रयाइम म ें worked in Judo and is still doing very good work in Judo.
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आपको ररजल्ट लयाकर वदखयाएग की आप दवनयया म वहदस्यान कया नयाम Some athletes are sitting in this hall and you cannot even
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और ऊचया होत हुए दखग। थक य। धन्यियाद! imagine that a para-athlete can do this. A blind athlete
who does not know whether the next step is going to go
Translated version: into a pit, on mud, or on a stone, athlete participates and
As a coach, I believe in leading by performance. How runs in the Olympics. The first blind athlete who is given
many of you knew about parasports before 2010? the Arjuna Award. The same blind athlete topped History
Devendra Jhajharia ji set a world record and won a gold Honours from St. Stephens College and won three gold
medal in the 2004 Olympics. No one in India even knew medals in the Asian Games. He is also sitting inside this
that someone had won a gold medal. hall. Can you imagine how he used to travel from St.
Stephens College to Nehru Stadium for training? A blind
The team was going to the Tokyo Olympics in 2020. The athlete? Do you talk about the tactile path? When he used
ministry was repeatedly asking us how many medals we to go out on the tactile path with a stick, how he used to
would bring back. We confidently told them we would reach the University metro station at five in the morning,
bring home 15 medals but we exceeded expectations from the metro station he would come to Nehru Stadium
and brought 19. In the Asian Games, the ministry asked and then go back and attend all the classes and top
us how many medals will we bring. We said maybe 100 History Honours and win three gold medals in the Asian
but we brought 111 medals. How did all this happen? How Games. This is the power of para-sports.
did all this change happen? All this happened within 15-
20 years and every person in India began to know about Let me tell you about another athlete. It takes five to six
parasports. I would like to tell the story of this growth. years of training to reach the pinnacle of any sport. In
This success was not the effort of one individual, but the sports, there is an event in athletics called the high jump.
result of collaboration and teamwork. People are sitting Standing at just 167 cm he is shorter than me. The second
in this hall who have worked very hard. I would like to most important thing is leg strength. On that front too the
take the name of Munavvar Anjar ji sitting here who has chances appear meek as by birth one leg is shorter than

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