Report: Lifter Punam Yadav played with injury, claims IWLF chief

The athlete from Uttar Pradesh had a poor showing in the women's 76kg category.

IWLF (Indian Weightlifting Federation) President Sahdev Yadav accused Punam Yadav of having competed with an injury. She had all three failed attempts in the clean and jerk phase in the women's 76kg category at the Commonwealth Games. 

Punam Yadav failed to get validation for all her three attempts in the clean and jerk phase and got disqualified. The IWLF President expressed his dismay at the performance of the weightlifter. “She competed without being fully fit,” he asserted. 

Punam Yadav snatched a gold medal at the Gold Coast CWG in the 69kg category. In Birmingham she participated in the 76kg category. She was rightly in silver medal position after the snatch round with 98kg in her third attempt. 

The Quotes

After her disappointing performance amidst such brilliance in weightlifting by the Indian contingent, the federation chief was clearly unhappy and said the lifter competed with an injury to her knee.

“Ek medal hath se chhut gayi”—Yadav told PTI. 

He further said, “That’s why we initially we had held back her name. But, the athlete claimed she's fit and showed a fitness certificate issued by a doctor. There's no way we could withhold her name as she joined the team late.

"If you notice her lifts closely, she was not giving her best force while lifting the barbell from clean to jerk. The knee has to bend to get that full force.

"But in her case, it was missing. It's clear that she's not 100 per cent and we lost out on a medal," Yadav claimed.

When asked for clarification, Punam claimed that she was fully fit. She further added, “Niggles are part and parcel of a lifter's life and I was on course. It happens, my sheer bad luck".

'No Lift' controversy

She was eying on her third Commonwealth Games medal and was in contention after the snatch round. But, in clean and jerk round she had two consecutive failed attempts of 116kg and at last she had a neat clean and jerk but dropped the bar before the three judges gave her green signal which led to her disqualification in this CWG. 

"Usne smile kiya and main throw kar diya (One of the judges smiled and I dropped it without seeing the light)," said Punam on her third invalid lift. 

Indian has won 8 medals in total in Weightlifting this CWG which includes 3 Gold medals. India is leading the board in Weightlifting event with more strong contenders ahead to challenge in medal contention. 

For more updates, follow Khel Now on Twitter, and Instagram and join our community on Telegram.