Shot putter Abha Khatua and the curious case of a missing Olympic aspirant

Shot putter Abha Khatua had decided to pursue her Olympic dream despite a family tragedy recently but the national record-holder is missing from India's Paris-bound contingent and as of now, there is no clear answer as to why her name has been knocked off the list.

Khatua left the country for Spala in Turkiye, the base for India's Olympic-bound athletics contingent, on July 11 along with her other team-mates. But the very next day, she was not there in the list of track and field Olympic participants published by World Athletics.

The 29-year-old, who made the Paris Games cut through the world rankings quota, eventually did not figure in the Indian contingent of 117 approved by the sports ministry.

The track and field team now has 29 members, instead of the 30 who were announced by the Athletics Federation of India.

There is no word yet on whether her name has been dropped owing to injury, a doping violation or any other technical issue. Repeated attempts to reach her have been unsuccessful and the officialdom has decided to stonewall queries around her absence.

An Athletics Federation of India official merely said that the AFI was not aware of any issue with her.

When contacted, a World Athletics official also refused to comment on the issue.

"World Athletics has a long-standing practice not to provide specific comment on individual selection decisions," the official responded to a PTI query.

Born to a farmer father at Khurshi village near Narayangarh town in West Bengal's West Midnapur district, Khatua tried her hand at a variety of track and field disciplines before settling for shot put five years ago.

Before leaving India on July 11, she spoke to PTI and revealed that she would make her Olympic debut despite the death of her sister-in-law (brother's wife) recently.

Khatua was close to her and admitted to being in a shock but she decided to go ahead nonetheless given the sacrifices that her parents had made despite their modest means.

"I lost my sister-in-law a few days ago and so I am not in the best of mental state. No doubt, I was excited after I qualified for the Paris Games, because becoming an Olympian is every athlete's dream.

"I had thought of this since childhood," she had said on July 11, just before heading to Spala.

"I got a jolt because of this family tragedy. I am of course taking part in my first Olympics. My parents have sacrificed a lot to see me compete in the Olympics." But less than 10 days before the Games, that dream seems to have fallen apart and without a known reason at this point.

Khatua was not in the frame for the Olympics till she broke the national record at the Federation Cup in April in Bhubaneswar with a gold-winning throw of 18.41m.

Even after that, she was outside the qualification bracket before her gold winning throw of 17.53m -- a mediocre effort by any standard -- at the National Inter-State Championships.

Khatua, who was well below the cut initially in the Road to Paris list of World Athletics, jumped to 21st in rankings with 1059 points from the National Inter-State Championships, which was a category A event unlike the category F status of the Federation Cup.

Thirty-two athletes will compete in the women's shot put event in Paris. Fifteen took the automatic qualification route by breaching the 18.80m mark while 17 made the cut through world rankings.

Last year, Khatua crossed the 18m mark twice in less than three months, but that was not enough to secure her a ticket to the Hangzhou Asian Games, though many believed that she should have been picked.

Even at that time, there was no explanation offered as to why she was not preferred despite reasonably good performances.