She wanted to quit the sport after missing medal in Rio: Mirabai Chanu’s mother

‘She carried India on her shoulders’ Mirabai’s mother and childhood coach recall the tough upbringing and hard work behind the Olympic silver.

Sixty-year-old Saikhom Tombi Devi still remembers the days when her youngest daughter Mirabai Chanu would collect firewood and carry it on her head to their contracted half-acre paddy field in village Nongthong Kakching near Imphal.

On Saturday, when the 25- year-old became only the fifth Indian to win an Olympic silver medal, Tombi and her husband Saikhom Kriti Singh along with her five other offsprings – Saikhom Ranjan, Ranjana, Ranjita, Nanao and Sanatomba – could not control their emotions.

“As a child, Mirabai used to help me on the half-acre land owned by a neighbour in our village. While my other children would spend time studying and weaving, Mirabai would carry the firewood on her head to support me. Sometimes, we would spend 3-4 hours in the morning and a similar duration in the evening at the farm and she would be only concerned about reducing my burden. Today, it feels like she has carried the whole of India on her shoulders,” an emotional Tombi told The Indian Express.

Devi and her husband came from small-time farming families and had six children – Mirabai being the youngest. With Singh working as a construction worker in the Manipur Public Works Department, Mirabai would grow up with limited resources and see her mother also running a small tea stall on the main road of the village to support the family.

“All our ancestors were small farmers and we did not even own our own land. My husband would earn Rs 2,000-3,000 per month and apart from working on the paddy fields, I would also run a tea stall at the village. We could not even afford proper diet for Mirabai or her siblings,” her mother remembers.

Fate plays a part

While a young Mirabai wanted to be an archer, according to Devi, a chance encounter with a weightlifter would ignite interest in the sport. It would see her travelling to Imphal, a city 20 km away, with her father to enquire about training at the Khuman Lampak Stadium. With former Asian medallist Anita Chanu being the weightlifting coach at the centre, Mirabai would give the weightlifting trials and be selected as one of the trainees.

“Mirabai had enquired about the weightlifting centre from her friends and neighbours and when we undertook the physical and other tests like running, lifting weights, she had a very natural squat and lift style. Her body muscle mass was good and I remember seeing her for the first time and thinking that she can be a good weightlifter,” remembers Anita, a former team-mate of seven-time Worlds medallist Kunjarani Devi.

The youngster would become junior national champion in Chhattisgarh in 2009 before breaking into the national camp in 2011.With the training at the academy being held twice a day, Chanu also remembers Mirabai avoiding the return journey to her village and spending the afternoons at the academy with home-made steamed black and white rice, rich in carbohydrates and minerals, and boiled vegetables.

“Unlike other kids, she would stay at the academy post the morning session and would return to her village only after the evening session. She would always bring steamed black rice as lunch and it would mean that she had a lot of carbohydrates and it helped her in a way. While we started her weightlifting training with pieces of wood, within days, she would lift more than 70 Kgs, almost double her own weight. I still remember making a trip to her village to meet her parents. Seeing their financial condition, I only told them that their girl will bring laurels to the country one day and she has done so on the biggest stage today,” says Chanu.

Tombi would be waiting eagerly for her youngest daughter in the evenings. “Sometimes, she would travel on sand trucks or cycle to Imphal. There were days when she would have fare for only half the distance and would walk back home. Sometimes, her elder sisters would save money from their weaving and give her money for fare or other training expenses. The only thing which she did not lack was will power,” she recalls.

Quick rise & a setback

The subsequent years would see Mirabai winning a silver medal at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow with a combined total of 170 Kg and would train under national coach Vijay Sharma. In 2016, she lifted a combined total of 192 Kg to break Kunjarani’s 12-year-old national record months before the Rio Olympics.

At Rio, Mirabai would only manage one clean lift, 82 Kg in snatch resulting in a Did Not Finish result. Tombi remembers fainting on hearing the news, but the family regrouped and would spend hours with Mirabai on her return. “When I got the call from Mirabai and she told me about the result, I fainted. The whole family cried. Mirabai told me that she was nervous and wanted to quit the sport. But we told her that we will give full support but she shouldn’t stop trying. It’s a struggle and you can’t quit in the middle of your struggle. Whenever she would get injured, I would pray and not sleep for days.”

In the last five years, Mirabai has won the Commonwealth Games gold in 2018 followed by a fourth-place finish with a national record of 201 Kg in the 49 Kg category at the 2019 World Championships in Thailand. Earlier this year, she won a bronze with a combined total of 205 Kg at the Asian Championships in Tashkent.

“When she went to USA for training, I told her not to be tense and just train her best under coach Vijay Sharma sir. Whenever she visits Imphal, she is always eager to train the kids here and with this medal, more kids will get motivated,” says Chanu.

As for Tombi, she looking forward to making her daughter’s favourite dishes, apart from seeing her with the Olympic medal.

“She always brings something for all of us on her return. I have still kept a white shawl she got me from abroad. I will be wearing that shawl apart from making her favourite Meiti dishes including Kangsoi (vegetable stew), Iromba (boiled vegetables with fermented fish) and Paknam (Banana flower with chickpea flour and fermented fish steam cooked in turmeric leaves),” says the elated mother.

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