Credit: X
Three-time Commonwealth Games gold medalist Vinesh Phogat announced that she is returning her Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award and Arjuna Award. The statement was made less than a week after the appointment of the new Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) chief Sanjay Singh, a close aide of the former governing body head, Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh.
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After the election, some of India's top wrestlers like Sakshi Malik announced her retirement from the sport while Bajrang Punia announced that he would return his Padma Shri honour. Since then, Vinesh Phogat came on X (formerly Twitter) to return her major government accolades.
The letter said, “I remember the year 2016 when Sakshi Malik had won the Olympic medal and your government had made her the ambassador for the ‘Beti Bachao, beti padhao’ campaign. All of us female athletes were happy and were congratulating each other then.”
Now that she has quit wrestling, are we just meant to be published as government ads? I’d dreamt of winning a medal at the Olympics, but now that’s becoming blurred. I’ll just pray that the female athletes coming in the future get to fulfil their dreams,” she added.
“Our lives aren’t as fancy as those advertisements. Female wrestlers have lived the past few overs in suffocation. Those who’ve exploited us have managed to ensure their domination as well. If you can just spare five minutes of your life to go through that man’s statements, you’ll know. He’s called women wrestlers as Manthara, openly accepted that he’s made women wrestlers feel uncomfortable and never spared an opportunity to malign us. It’s scary how he has ensured that we step back,” Vinesh continued.
“I tried forgetting all of what’s happened, but it’s not that easy. We’ve been dragging ourselves on the streets in search of justice. Our medals and awards are being termed as worth only Rs 15, but these are more dear to us than our lives. When we won, we were called as pride of the country. Now that we raise our voices against injustice, we are being deemed as traitors.”
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“I can’t imagine what must’ve been going through Bajrang’s head when he returned his Padma Shri. But keeping that photo of his in mind, I feel ashamed of my awards. When I’d won them, my mother had shared sweets to the neighbors. Look, how beautiful my daughter looks while receiving that award,” she’d say to them. I get scared just thinking what they’d be saying to her now looking at my current state,” the letter concluded.
