Rumal pockets medals but not fame

New Delhi, Oct 8: He's 28 but he's lost all hope. Johny Rumal, who won the C-1 gold (500m) at the recently concluded Nationals at Srinaga...

New Delhi, Oct 8: He’s 28 but he’s lost all hope. Johny Rumal, who won the C-1 gold (500m) at the recently concluded Nationals at Srinagar (Kashmir), and considered by many as the best canoer in the country, exemplifies all that can go wrong for a gifted but penniless man in sport.

Brought up on Andaman and Nicobar, Johny was one of the first to take up canoeing in the late eighties, and won for India it’s first gold medal in 1991 (C-1 1000m) at Asian Championships in Tokyo. A pleasure to watch

as he knives through the waters, all that Johny has today is a ringside seat.

He’s out of the national camp at Alappuzha, missed out on a chance to represent India at the South African marathon championships this month because of a passport hassle, earns barely enough to have one proper meal a day, and still cannot fathom what hit him.

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The trouble, it seems, started in October last year after Johny returned from a South Korea trip where the team finished fourth in C-2 (500 and 1000m). Unlike the other nationalcampers, Johny could not get back to Alappuzha in time simply because he could not get a ship. A flat envelope soon arrived in the Andaman SAI centre saying Johny need not return to Alappuzha, sources say.

But the IKCA boss, Avinash C Kohli has a different explanation: “His timings were not good enough,” he said.

Whatever the reason, Johny has had it real rough and things have only got worse. He got married recently and his wife can’t understand why he still continues in a sport that has given him nothing but pain. Ask him what he does for a living and Johny is vague. He says he works in the `Education Department’. But his friends say he’s a peon and probably feels too ashamed to admit it.

His friends also say that his wife, in a rage, burnt all his certificates when she saw no one even cared even to look at him when he was burning with fever recently.

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Yet, Johny travelled nine days — four by sea, three by train and two by road — for the Srinagar Championships. He won, of course, and got a brandnew certificate to take home to his wife. He loves the waters far too much to let go.

Factfile

Won for India it’s first medal at the 1991 Asian Championships, Tokyo (C-1 1000m)

Asian Championships, Hiroshima ‘1993: Bronze (C-2 500m)

Asian Games, 1994:

Bronze (C-2 500m)

Asian Championships, South Korea, 1997: fourth (C-2 500 & 1000m)

National Games 1997, Bangalore: C-1 200m: Silver, C-1 500m: Silver, C-1 1000m: Silver

Srinagar National Championships, 1998:

Gold (C-1 500m)