MADURAI: Athlete V Revathi, 23, from Madurai district will represent India at the Tokyo Olympics in the mixed relay event. She is among three women from Tamil Nadu taking part in the event at Tokyo next month.
During the Olympic trial event held on Sunday, she qualified to be a part of the Indian contingent to the Olympics by covering a distance of 400 metres in 53.55 seconds, thus emerging first. The District Sports and Youth Welfare Officer N Lenin told The New Indian Express that Revathi is the first woman athlete from the district to participate in the Olympics.
Earlier in the year 1988, Madurai athlete Thirugnanadurai took part in the men's category of 4x100 metres during the Olympics held at Seoul in South Korea.
Revathi's maternal grandmother K Aarammal (71), a native of Sakkimangalam said, "While Revathi was about six years old, her father passed away due to illness and her mother died of the same eight months later. I then brought Revathi and her five-year-old sister Rekha to my hut at Sakkimangalam."
Raising the two girls single-handedly was very difficult said the septuagenarian who became a widow at a young age. "I took up odd jobs. I worked at brick chambers, cleaned the dining area at marriage halls, removed weeds at agricultural fields to earn a meagre Rs 100 per day to feed the three of us. The sisters studied in government schools, staying at hostels," their grandmother shared.
Revathi took interest in athletics during school days and with the motivation of her hostel wardens she began to practice at Race Course stadium. "I tried my best to stop her from pursuing athletics fearing injuries and worried that there was none to take care of her. But, she had already set her heart on it," Aarammal laughed.
Revathi's coach K Kannan (45) who spotted her talent in 2015 when she was in class XII told, "Inspired by coach Ramanathan from Devakottai who had trained many gold medallists in Asian Games and Arjuna award recipient sprinter Ramasamy Gnanasekaran in the late 1970s and early 1980s, I set a goal to send an athlete to Olympics representing the country, when I could not become one."
Recalling the instance when he first saw Revathi on the track, the coach said, "Revathi who took part in the zonal level athletic meet for school students, was the only athlete to run barefoot. Watching her sprint that day, I found that she had the talent and the spark in her and that she would go places, if trained well. However, she was hesitant due to her poor financial background and that her grandmother would not allow her to pursue the sport. In three years, she struck gold in national-level events making me more confident that I could risk anything to push her towards her Olympic debut. In fact, she finished fourth during the Asian Games held in 2019, missing the bronze medal in 100 metres relay only by a few seconds."
Aarammal shared that it was only with the help and constant motivation by the coach that Revathi joined college through sports quota and even got a job at Madurai in Southern Railways. "I had to borrow to pay Rs 4,000 for hostel mess, that was the only fee collected every year at Lady Doak College. I could not afford to give her a nutritious diet. Everything was taken care of by the coach. He bought Revathi her first pair of shoes, sportswear, arranged for travel during outstation athletic events. I am indebted to him," she spoke as tears welled up.
Reacting to the young woman's feat, the grandmother said, "I am no longer scared. I am confident that she would make us proud. Revathi is determined to bring laurels to the country."
Revathi who is currently at the National Institute of Sports at Patiala was unavailable for comment.
Minister for Commercial Taxes and Madurai East MLA P Moorthy who congratulated Revathi over phone later said that he would extend all necessary support to her. Finance Minister and Madurai Central MLA PTR Palanivel Thiagarajan and Madurai MP S Venkatesan took to Twitter to convey their best wishes to the athlete.