Anomaly also in team selection in SAI, allege parents

ALAPPUZHA: The parents of the athletes in Alappuzha SAI centre, who had attempted suicide, have given the statement to the police that the rowing athletes were harassed at the hostel and certain officials behaved in a biased manner.  

The incident related to the case took place on May 6 at the SAI centre at Punnamada in Alappuzha. Four rowing athletes had taken poisonous fruits to kill themselves. Among them Aparna (17), the daughter of Panakkal Chembathara Ramabhadran and Geetha and the athlete who had won four medals including gold in national events, had passed away. Other girls Shilpa (17), Tresa Jacob (17), a national games kayaking gold medallist and Sabita (17) are still under treatment in the Alappuzha medical college. 

Aparna’s post-mortem report was received by the investigation team on Wednesday. The cause of death has been mentioned as the consumption of poisonous fruit. No another unnatural reasons for death are mentioned in the report. 

Shilpa’s parents are former athletes of SAI. They disclosed to the investigation team that seniors in the centre used to mentally harass their juniors and during the selection procedures, the officials favoured certain students. “Even in the recently held national games, some athletes were side-lined in this manner. Juniors didn’t dare to disclose the harassment stories, for they were scared of seniors. The girls planned to commit suicide as they could no more tolerate the harassment,” they told the police.

Police will take the statements from the girls in hospital once their conditions improve. The investigation is being led by Alappuzha Crime Detachment DySP Parthasarathy Pillai and ASP Merlin Joseph.