HYDERABAD
He lost his right hand in an electric short-circuit mishap at the age of three, but not the hope of making it big in life. Now, 20-year-old U. Mohan Harsha is the toast of former All England champion P. Gopi Chand and SAI athletics coach N. Ramesh, who identify young talent and groom them through the Gopi-Mytrah Foundation.
Reason? Harsha bagged the 100m silver (T47 category) at the Dubai World Para Athletics Grand Prix in 11.26 seconds on Tuesday. The gold medallist from Indonesia Nur Ferry Pradana clocked 11.12.
“I believe sports gives para athletes their own identity, rather than being called one of the specially challenged individuals. The best example being para shuttler and former world champion Manasi Joshi,” Gopi said.
Interestingly, it was coach Nagaraju, who first spotted the Tirupati-based Harsha in the Kendriya Vidyalaya Cluster athletics meet and convinced his parents to visit Gachibowli (Hyderabad) once, without actually telling them the exact reason behind the invite.
“They were not aware why they were asked to visit the sports complex along with their son. But, once they were convinced their son’s future would be brighter with specialised training, they decided to leave him in Hyderabad under our mentorship,” Ramesh told The Hindu.
Hard work
“Since I believed he had the speed, the focus was on sprints. Luckily Harsha was a never-say-no talent to hours of training despite the major handicap.”
Harsha won the gold at the last senior National in the same event which helped him qualify for the Dubai World meet, and sponsors like Colgate started chipping in, giving him monthly scholarship. The Gopi-Mytrah Foundation takes care of diet, training and boarding expenses.
“I told Harsha that once you are on the track, you are like any other normal athlete for me. And you also never think that you are physically challenged,” said Ramesh.
Big dreams
To the master’s delight, Harsha, a product of the Pay & Play Scheme of SAI Sports Training Centre (Hyderabad) and now representing Telangana, is now dreaming big — to win a medal in the Paralympics.
