THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Abhijith Amalraj, 17, won a gold in the World Roller-Skating Championship held in Barcelona recently without any sponsorship from private parties or government.
His parents have coughed up several lakhs of rupees for his foreign training in Rome and now he is in need of government funding.
Abijith is a Plus-Two student of Netaji Higher Secondary School, Pramadom in Pathanamthitta district, who passed out recently scoring full marks though he was busy training in roller-skating at various centres. He had scored A + in all subjects in his tenth grade also.
Abhijith and his parents-- Biju Rajan, a chartered accountant, and S. S. Suja-- have been knocking at all doors seeking financial assistance for a long time. But their pleas have fallen on deaf ears while two roller -skaters from Haryana were provided Rs 5 lakh each by that government when they went to Barcelona. So far roller-skating has not been included in Olympics, but ice-skating is in winter Olympics.
Abijith has won medals in ice -skating held at Dubai Golden Cup, Taiwan Open Cup and Malaysian Open Cup. Rajesh Acklethu, manager of Netaji Higher Secondary School, who constructed a skating rink at his school for Abhijith, told DC, "being a brilliant student, Abhijith can score top ranks in the NEET medical entrance exam. But his ambition is to compete in the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing and win a gold medal for India. Abijith has been practising in the ice rinks in a leading mall in Kochi, Gurgaon and also in Malaysia and most recently in Rome. His parents can no longer afford to send him for foreign practice", said Rajesh.
Abhijith told DC that he had paid 100 Euros per hour to his Italian coach, Luca D Alisera, for a month's training making him poorer by over Rs 8 lakh.
"If I have to win gold medal in ice- skating, I should be exposed to foreign ice-skating rinks. The ice- skating rinks in India are not of Olympic standards. A total of 120 skaters had taken party in the World Roller-Skating Championship, Barcelona, where I was the lone skater to make the country proud," said Abhijith. He had won two silvers and a bronze in the previous World Roller-Skating Championships held in France, China and Italy.
