Last year was a stunning one for Vithya Ramraj. The 25-year-old from Tamil Nadu, who had been living in the shadows of bigger names earlier, equalled P.T. Usha’s National record on her way to the 400m hurdles bronze in the Hangzhou Asian Games where she also helped India to silver medals in the 4x400m women’s and mixed relays.
The quartermiler-hurdler was the toast of the country then but her stunning progress had also raised eyebrows among close followers of the sport. Now, the worry lines have gone deeper.
Despite this being an Olympic year, Vithya has still not joined the national camp for quartermilers and relay runners which is currently on in Thiruvananthapuram.
“I don’t know where she is. She was in the Reliance (Foundation) centre but for some reason she was expelled from Reliance... somebody told me that she is in Chennai,” Radhakrishnan Nair, the chief national coach, told The Hindu from the Chennai airport on Monday night.
Sometime in mid-February, there was talk that needles, syringes and banned substances were found in a top academy in Mumbai following which a few athletes were expelled from there.
Vithya, also the National Games 400m champion, did not answer calls or messages from this writer the last few days but, late on Monday night, her coach Nehpal Singh claimed that these were merely rumours.
“These are just rumours spread by people who are not happy with Vithya doing well. She is now training with me in Chennai for the last three weeks,” said Nehpal.
“A few of my athletes were called to the Reliance camp, I was also called to coach them. We, including Vithya, (her twin sister) Nithya and Siva (a sprinter), were there in Mumbai for some time. The facilities there were good, but I was not comfortable with the corporate way of things, so I left. And my athletes also left with me. Vithya was not expelled from the centre.”
Nehpal also confirmed that Vithya will be running the 400m Indian Open, the Indian track and field season-opener for seniors, in Thiruvananthapuram on March 18.
Earlier, in October, 23 athletes from various sports were expelled from the JSW’s Inspire Institute of Sport in Ballari, Karnataka, after syringes were found in many places in the training centre.
