JAVED CAN NEVER BE AN ATHLETE NOW

JAVED CAN NEVER BE AN ATHLETE NOW
Greater Kashmir Sept 21

FROM REPRESENTING SCHOOL IN ATHLETICS COMPETITION TO FACING THE TRAUMA OF AN AMPUTATED LEG AND SIX SURGERIES, THE EIDGAH BOY'S DREAMS ARE SHATTERED.

RABIA NOOR / NAZIA AKHTAR

Srinagar, Sept 20: Javed Ahmad Pathan wanted to become an athlete. And he had a perfect pair of legs, which were shaping into legs of an athlete with constant practice. And then a bullet fired by the CRPF troopers hit him in the leg that was amputated, and with that, his dream.
On 12 August, the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) troopers fired at a peaceful pro-independence demonstration. Javed was hit in the right leg. The bullet had severed a major vein, damaged vital tissues and the bone. Luck didn’t favour him either. Due to heavy rush of people wounded in CRPF firing in the Valley, there was acute shortage of blood.
Javed remained unconscious all this time, and then the doctors at SKIMS, Soura took the life-changing decision: amputate his leg.
“When he regained consciousness in the post-operative ward, nobody dared to tell him anything. The reality slowly dawned upon him,” said Javed’s uncle, “Tears flowed from his eyes, and he didn’t utter a word either.”
“I won’t be an athlete now,” Javed said, “everything has changed.”
A student of Eight Grade, Javed represented his school, Government High School Narwara, in an Inter-State competition at Jammu last year. He was a regular visitor to Bakshi Stadium where he would practice and exercise. He lives at Saidpora near Eidgah grounds, a popular playfield.
“We lost the competition not because we didn’t perform well, but because there was discrimination. There was anti-Kashmir bias,” Javed said.
Javed is the only son and eldest among four siblings. “He is very good at studies, too. He always scores a minimum of 75 per cent marks every year and his favourite subject is Science,” said his mother.
Being a meritorious student, Javed’s parents had very high expectations from him. At this time, however, they are concerned about the health of their only son.
His family says that he has been operated upon six times in less than a month.
And his trauma is physical and psychological, but an athlete in him would be feeling the physical part more than the psychological.

When he regained consciousness in the post-operative ward, nobody dared to tell him anything. The reality slowly dawned upon him. Tears flowed from his eyes, and he didn’t utter a word either.