New Delhi, Jan 6: Outgoing Sports Authority of India (SAI) director General Jiji Thomson considers his efforts for the rehabilitation of women athletes Dutee Chand and Santhi Soundarajan as the high point of his controversy-filled two-year tenure.
“I would count the rehabilitation of Soundarajan and fighting for the cause of Dutee as the high point of my tenure. We allowed Soundarajan to take coaching diploma in Bangalore and now she is employed by us,” Thomson said here Tuesday.
Dutee was banned from taking part in any competition under IAAF’s hyperandrogenism policy, which bars female athletes having higher level of male hormones from competing. She appealed against the IAAF policy at the CAS which recently allowed her to take part in national events pending a final decision.
“As for Dutee, we bore the legal cost of her appeal at the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS) against the IAAF policy on hyperandrogenism. We thought it was injustice to her and her dignity as a woman. Nowhere in the world, a government sports body has taken up this kind of issue for a sportsperson,” Thomson pointed out.
Soundarajan was stripped of the 800m silver medal she won in the 2006 Doha Asian Games after she failed a ‘gender test’. The Tamil Nadu runner slipped into oblivion after that and there were reports of her attempting suicide and working as a daily wage labourer.
PTI