CHENNAI: Near the announcement desk at Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, this conversation between the announcer and athletes was heard quite often. Athletes were asking about results and events to follow and the announcer was replying in a somewhat frustrated tone: “We have not received the results yet. We will let you know.” Not often in an athletics meet are results announced after the last day’s action. But this was the case at the 33rd inter-district junior athletic meet. Even those who finished their events on the first two days had to wait till the completion of the meet on Sunday to know where they had finished.
Even the announcer appointed by the Tamil Nadu Athletic Association was taken aback. It’s common practice that result sheets are given to him by volunteers after every event. For some reason, this was not done on the three days of the meet.
This led to confusion among athletes, coaches and parents. They had to wait till the end of the final day to know the timings, distances and where they had finished. All of them said the situation is normally different in meets of this nature. However, organisers Tiruvallur District Athletic Association did not find this to be an issue. “There is no need to announce results when the athletes know who finished where,” was an official’s response. “In track events, we use photo finish to accurately gauge the placings.” But these were not released until the meet was over.
One of the U-14 athletes from Tiruppur district, who completed his event on Saturday at 11 am, said he waited till Sunday evening to collect the medal. “Usually when an event gets over, they announce the results along with meet records, if any. We asked volunteers and officials. But their response was not clear. Only during the closing ceremony did we get the result sheet with all the information.”
Another athlete from Tirunelveli said this situation forced him and his parents to extend their stay. “As per schedule, my son’s event would have been over by Saturday. So we planned to leave today,” said a parent.
“We don’t know why they distributed only a few medals on Saturday. We were not informed when they would give away the prizes. Since it’s a weekend, we had no major problems. But had it been on weekdays, our daily routine would have got affected.”
srinidhi@newindianexpress.com