Incheon: Controversy hit the Asian Games boxing competition after India's L Sarita Devi (60kg) had to settle for a bronze medal despite dominating her semifinal bout even as M C Mary Kom (51kg) continued her winning run to enter the summit clash of the mega-event here on Tuesday.
The Indian woman boxer in fray, Pooja Rani (75kg), also had to settle for a bronze after losing a closely-contested semifinal bout to China's Li Qian.
But what triggered massive outrage was Sarita's loss which left the Manipuri in tears. Up against home favourite Jina Park, Sarita, the Commonwealth Games silver-medallist, went down 0-3 despite clearly being the better boxer.
Sarita simply pummelled her rival with her flurry of quicksilver blows -- at times raining four to her rival's one. But shockingly, Park was not given a single standing count by the Algerian referee Hammadi Yakoub Kheira despite looking rocked back by Sarita's blows to her chin.
In the end, all three ringside judges ruled in favour of the Korean by identical 39-37 margins. The ringside judges were Braham Mohamad of Tunisia, Albino Foti of Italy and Mariusz Josef Gorny of Poland.
Immediately after the bout, a tearful Sarita broke down while talking to journalists.
"All my hard work has come to nought. It has happened to me but kindly see that this kind of injustice is not meted out to anyone else in the competition. I request you," she said tearfully with folded hands. "If they wanted to award the bout to her, then why allow us to fight in the first place," she added.
Her husband and former footballer Thoiba Singh was even more furious and shouted obscenities at the ring officials, saying it was a clear case of cheating.
"You are killing boxing," he shouted repeatedly and even went to the extent of trying to enter the ring again to cry out at the injustice but was prevented by the security officials. India's long-time Cuban coach B I Fernandez also called it a clear case of cheating, but said no purpose would be served by lodging a protest that will cost the Indian contingent USD 500 and will be forfeited if the appeal was lost.
Meanwhile, Pooja Rani bagged bronze after she lost to Qian Li of China in their middleweight (69-75kg) semifinal bout.
