Indian women threaten to quit Games

Press, 27 September 1988, Page 23

Indian women threaten to quit Games

NZPA-Reuter Seoul Three of India’s six-strong all-women track team threatened an Olympic mutiny yesterday in a row over who runs in the relay. The trio said they would pull out of the Games unless their country’s 4x400 metres relay team was changed. India’s track and field squad in Seoul are all women because the men were not good enough to qualify. Vandana Rao burst into tears and said she would leave Seoul on the next flight if team officials > refused to let her run in the relay on Friday. The squad will be chosen from P. T. Usha, Mercy Kuttan, Shiny Abraham, Ashwini Nachappa, Vandana Shanbagh and Rao. Three of them were in the winning team at the 1986 Asian Games. Nachappa and Shanbagh said they would refuse to run if P. T. Usha, the Asian 400 metres hurdles champion, was included in the team when she was not fit. A heel injury kept Usha out of the Olympic selection trials but the Government pressed for her inclusion in the team for Seoul because of her past performance. Usha, who came fourth in the 1984 Los Angeles Games, finished thirty-first out of 35 competitors in the hurdles heats on Sunday. She told reporters afterwards her heel was still troubling her. “Usha is clearly not physically fit to run. Vandana Rao should be running in her place,” Nachappa said. “All three of us are prepared to leave for home,” she said. “The chef (de mission, K. P. Singh Deo) insulted us and told us we were here because of the charity of the Government and asked Rao why her parents could not bring her up properly. “We are not prepared to listen to this.” Deo was not available for comment. An official said Rao would have to run against Usha in a 400 metre trial today to decide the fourth member of the relay squad.