Dutee Chand thanks Gopichand - who fed her dry fruit & chicken - for getting her back on track

As she eyes gold in the 2020 OIympics in Tokyo, Dutee Chand looks back on the major roadblocks that briefly halted her career, and her return to the sport to reign supreme.

“Chemicals, androgens, male hormones… they cannot alter who I am. I’m a woman.” Emotion is palpable in the voice of champion sprinter Dutee Chand when she speaks to ETPanache over the phone from her home in Chaka Gopalpur, Odisha. She discusses her trying times and her historic triumphs at the Asian Games, her words and tone are of a person who has overcome adversity and accomplished something.

Chand, 22, scored a sprint double at the Asian Games — silver medals in the 100 and 200 metres. But just four years ago, in the run-up to the previous edition of the Asian Games, she endured a nightmarish lowpoint. The Indian Athletic Federation (IAF) dropped her from the Asian and Commonwealth Games contingents for having hyperandrogenism — high levels of the male hormone testosterone.


“Hyperandrogenism can lead to a life ban, unlike a dope test where you can come back in a few years,” Chand says. “Santhi Soundarajan and Pinki Pramanik faced the same. People started to talk rudely to me and looking at me as if I was not a woman. It was like hell.”

She successfully appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), which vetoed the IAAF’s policy on hyperandrogenism. According to the ruling, there was not enough evidence to prove that testosterone levels helped female athletes’ performance. Chand was free to run again. At Rio 2016, she became only the third Indian to compete in the women’ 100 metres. And, in Jakarta, she produced a performance with which she well and truly turned a page on the pain of the previous years.

“The Asian Games was a comeback meet for me. I was running for my life,” she said.

Family support
Chand says that the support of near ones helped her through the difficult phase. “My trust in God, the people around me got me through it. I realised that I am a woman because I am a woman. I want to be an example to many other athletes who have faced such taints. My silver medals are the silver lining for many, I know deep within.”

Having salvaged her reputation, Chand is hoping to rebuild her current family home, a makeshift structure.

“In the past four years, there were events in which I was unable to perform well because of various reasons,” she says. “But now when the Asian Games came, I challenged myself that I would get back in the team and get medals [and earn money for the house].”

Explaining how she turned it all around, Chand says, “I worked hard on my fitness, running, exercise, diet and mental toughness. My coach, Ramesh Nagapuri, guided me, as did my support team. The journey was tough for them as well, but my medals are a reward for us all. Yes, I would have loved to win gold, but silver also is a huge boost to me after what happened in 2014.”

Gopichand’s gift
Chand also credits Indian badminton coach Pullela Gopichand for her return. “My coach and Gopichand are good friends. I call him Gopi bhaiya. He gave me dry fruit and allowed me to eat chicken and fish, which was needed for my nutrition. He and his family even opened their kitchen and allowed me to cook for myself, as they only made South Indian food,” she says.

Gopichand guided her training and gave her much needed faith, which she was losing. “I was shattered,” she says. “[The allegations] It made me want to scream. I had a tough time training and I owe a lot to Gopichand. He fulfilled my coach’s request to let me practice at his academy before the Rio Olympics.”

Eyes on Tokyo
Top level athletics is expensive. Chand struggled with money initially. “When I started, I had no money for shoes and had to run barefoot,” she says. “There was no ground near our house, so I had to run on roads and in fields. There was no money to eat the right food. But I trained hard. Our family did not have money to educate us. Sports was the way to ensure that we did well and got jobs. I am happy that I have set an example. I want to win gold now and will be training hard for the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo.”

And then she signs off to head for her evening workout.