Parents of a deceased table tennis player are awaiting compensation, and the government cites rules as justification
It’s been more than a month since their son, national-ranked TT player Vishwa Deenadayalan, died in a road accident on his way to Shillong for an inter-state tournament, and his parents are still waiting for a response from the Sports Authority of India (SAI) regarding insurance coverage under the Government’s flagship Khelo India initiative, which aims to “establish India as a great sporting nation.”
The 18-year-death old’s on the highway between Guwahati and Shillong on April 17 stunned the sporting world, prompting Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Sports Minister Anurag Thakur to express their condolences.
Vishwa’s father, Deenadayalan, told The Indian Express that he has been waiting for a response from the Sports Ministry and the SAI on the issue of insurance coverage for over three weeks.
“We had high expectations for Vishwa. He insisted on qualifying for the World Championships this year. Until I saw him play in the Olympics, I used to pray to God to keep me alive. But he’s no longer with us. “We’ve lost everything,” the father said, his voice breaking from emotion.
Deenadayalan, 58, is unemployed after losing his job in the HR department of a multinational corporation in Chennai in 2020. Anuradha, his wife, looks after their apartment in the city. “We made do with my savings,” he explained.
Vishwa was driving from Guwahati to Shillong with three teammates for the tournament when a trailer truck smashed through the divider and into their car on April 17.
The North Eastern Indira Gandhi Regional Institute of Health and Medical Sciences declared Vishwa “brought dead.” R Santosh Kumar, S Abinash Prasannaji, and D Kishore Kumar, his teammates, were injured in the accident.
The Tamil Nadu player was a national junior and sub-junior champion, as well as a member of the senior India team. He used to train at the Krishnaswamy TT club in Chennai, a non-accredited facility, as a rising star.
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