Bhubaneswar: Odisha’s sprint queen Dutee Chand has faced off with the state government once again.
In a Facebook post, the star athlete reminded the government of its promise to her and other athletes in 2016 to provide houses or land in Bhubaneswar. Six years have passed and the state government is yet to honour that promise, she wrote.
Dutee said that she was yet to get her promised house or land. She also shared the official letter she received from the state government in this regard. “An official communiqué was also sent to the General Administration Department in this regard. However, the state government has forgotten its promise,” she wrote.
In 2016, the state government had promised houses or plots in Bhubaneswar to Dutee and four other sportspersons – Purnima Hembram, Jauna Murmu, Amiya Kumar Mallick and Shrabani Nanda, who had put Odisha on the world map.
Dutee also represented India in the Tokyo Olympics.
The outspoken athlete is known for voicing her views on social media platforms.
In March, she had stirred a row by slamming the Odisha government’s sports policy.
The star athlete had criticised the BJD government for spending more on hockey and not paying attention to other games. “Though the Odisha government has been spending crores on developing sports infrastructure, the state has not been able to produce sportspersons who have performed in any global event satisfactorily, ostensibly due to mismanagement by the people at the helm of sports affairs,” she said.
Her post drew a sharp response from former India hockey captain and former BJD MP Dilip Tirkey.
In 2020, the Sports and Youth Services Department had informed that Dutee had received financial assistance of Rs 4.09 crore from the state government since 2015, after she put her BMW car on sale to fund her training. She has also been appointed as an officer in the state-run Odisha Mining Corporation (OMC), the department said.
The star sprinter, however, contested the claim on the ground that it included Rs 3 crore prize money for winning Asian Games medals and should not be considered as financial assistance for training.
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