New Delhi: Vinesh Phogat launched a scathing attack on legendary athlete and Indian Olympic Association (IOA) president PT Usha about her role after the wrestler was hospitalised during the Paris Olympics when desperate attempts were being made to bring down her weight to permissible limit before the final bout weigh-in.
Vinesh, who became India’s first female wrestler to reach an Olympic final, had to ultimately return empty-handed as she was disqualified for being 100 grams overweight at the weigh-in process.
Usha did meet Vinesh at the hospital in Paris last month and assured all support, having a photograph clicked of their meeting which was posted on social media, and went viral.
It was Usha’s attitude that Vinesh slammed as she accused the ‘Payyoli Express’ of clicking photographs on a hospital bed without her consent and politicising the matter rather than actually offering much help.
“I don’t know what support I got… PT Usha madam visited me at the hospital. One photo was clicked… In politics a lot happens behind closed doors. Similarly, politics happened there (in Paris) as well. That’s why I was heartbroken… A lot of people are saying ‘don’t leave wrestling’. For what should I continue! There is politics everywhere,” Vinesh told a local news channel.
“You are on a hospital bed, where you don’t know what’s happening outside, you are going through one of the worst phases of your life. At that place, just to show everyone you are standing with me you clicked a photo without telling me and then putting it on social media to say you are standing with me). That’s not how you show support. What was it more than posturing!” fumed Vinesh, who quit wrestling and took the plunge in politics by joining Congress along with Bajrang Puniya.