Vinesh Phogat Disqualified: 29-year-old girl. She stayed up all night cycling. Kept jogging. Kept jumping rope. Kept trying to lose weight without eating or drinking anything. When morning came, she was groaning in pain. But she was trying. Then her weight was measured. She had lost weight and it was 1900 grams. But this was 100 grams less than required and the result was that the girl was excluded from the Paris Olympics. Her heart was broken, the heart of the whole country was broken, because it was expected that this 29-year-old girl Vinesh Phogat would bring a gold medal for India. But now that Vinesh Phogat is out of the Olympic race, the story of Mary Kom comes to mind, who had lost two kilos of weight in just four hours in similar conditions.
This is the story of 15 September 2018. Silesian Open Boxing Tournament was being held in Poland. And India’s boxer and five-time world champion Mary Kom was also to participate in that tournament. Then Mary Kom had to box in the weight of 48 kg. But before the start of the match, Mary Kom’s weight had reached 50 kg. And for a moment it was thought that Mary Kom would be disqualified. But this did not happen. Because Mary Kom had lost two kilos of her weight within four hours. For this, Mary Kom did continuous skipping for an hour.
Mary Kom had said about that incident that “Our flight landed in Poland at around 3:30 in the morning. My weight was around 2 kg more. The weigh-in was to be done at 7:30 in the morning. So I had about four hours of time. If I was able to lose weight, I would have been in the competition and if I was not able to do so, I would have been out of the competition.”
Talking about the method of losing weight, Mary Kom had then said that she did skipping and stretching for an hour and was ready for the match. In that match, Mary Kom not only participated in the match after losing weight, but also won the gold medal by defeating Kazakhstan’s Aizerim 5-0.
But Vinesh Phogat could not do this in Paris Olympics. Even after trying all night, Vinesh Phogat’s weight was 100 grams more than the prescribed limit. However, if this was the first day of Vinesh’s competition, then perhaps Vinesh could have done something. Because any wrestler is given 30 minutes to weigh himself on the first day. And during this time he can weigh himself several times. But on the second day only 15 minutes are given for weighing.
It was the second day of Vinesh’s competition, so she also got only 15 minutes to weigh herself. And she was found to be overweight. The result was that she was disqualified from the Olympics. After hearing this news, Vinesh’s morale was broken. She fell ill and had to be admitted to the hospital. Now the whole country is with her. Despite being out of the Olympics, the courage that Vinesh has shown in the Olympics is an example for the coming generations.
