Former sprint queen PT Usha has alleged that vested interests were trying to derail her athletics school project but assured that it would start functioning by 2010. "I have devoted my life to earn an Olympic medal for the country which I missed narrowly...please do not play politics into it," she told a meet-the-press organised by the Calicut Press Club in Kozhikode.
Replying queries on her institution accepting over Rs 10 lakh as donation from a controversial businessman facing a vigilance inquiry, she said her school was receiving donations from several quarters and the businessman' contribution was one among them. Although the school had made several representations to the Centre for annual grants, she said it was yet to receive a favourable response.
Housing a 40-bed hostel, synthetic and grass tracks and a sports medicine centre, Usha said the school would certainly produce an Olympic medallist by 2012.Usha, who missed the bronze by a whisker in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, said she was able to conquer greater heights at national and international level despite poor infrastructure and lack of sponsorship. "Those were the times when we had to perform and perform to prove ourselves. There were neither adequate training facilities nor sponsors to boost our confidence," she said.
Usha said the school, estimated to cost Rs 50 crore, could function more effectively if the state and central governments sanctioned regular annual grants.
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