No Arshad Nadeem-Neeraj Chopra javelin duel in India for now

The highly anticipated face-off between Neeraj Chopra and Pakistan’s Arshad Nadeem, the gold medallist at Paris Olympics, on Indian soil has become a non-starter with the latter declining the invitation for the Neeraj Chopra Classic javelin event on Thursday, 24 April. The Classic, branded after Neeraj, is scheduled to be held in Bengaluru on 24 May, has been categorised as a Grade A tournament by World Athletics.

 Nadeem, whose monstrous 92.97 metres throw at Paris Olympics stunned the world to be an Olympic and Asian record and is also the sixth longest throw in history, said on Thursday he would not be a part of Neeraj’s event as the date clashes with his training regime for Asian Athletics Championship which runs from 27-31 May . The timing of the withdrawal, however, is uncanny as it comes two days after the dastardly Pahalgam terrorist attack in Jammu and Kashmir which saw 26 civilians being killed.

 It was only on Monday that Chopra unveiled plans for the event via a virtual media interaction where the likes of Anderson Peters and Thomas Rohler have already confirmed participation. Peters is a two-time world champion from Grenada and Rohler is the 2016 Olympics gold medallist. ‘’I have sent invitation to Arshad and he said he will get back to me after discussing with his coach. As of now he is yet to confirm participation,” the Tokyo Olympic gold medallist and world champion said.

A PTI report quotes Nadeem as saying: “The (NC) Classic event is from 20th May (May 24) whereas I am scheduled to leave for Korea on 22nd May for the Asian Athletics Championship.”  The Asian Championship runs from 27-31 May but an educated guess is that Nadeem’s decision has been influenced by the extremely strong anti-Pakistan sentiments in India over past few days in light of the attack and travel visa could have been a problem for Nadeem too after Indian government announced a slew of diplomatic restrictions on Wednesday.

There are no prizes for guessing that the bilateral sporting ties between India and Pakistan has taken a bodyblow after the Pahalgam attack – with cricket being the biggest casualty. Neeraj and Arshad, who put their respective countries on world javelin map with their stirring performances over the last two Olympics and World Athletics, have shared a great camaraderie among themselves since the junior days. Saroj Devi, Neeraj’s mother, had grabbed the headlines last year by saying: ‘’The one (Arshad) who won the gold is also my child,’’ when the Pakistan athlete relegated Neeraj to a silver medal in Paris. The statement also drew similar sentiments from Arshad’s mother while the athlete’s birthday wishes for Neeraj on 24 December last also went viral on social media.

However, Neeraj has not been spared by the trolls since Tuesday evening for inviting Arshad – with some even referring to his mother’s gesture. ‘’Your mother shouldn’t have said that Arshad Nadeem is like her son. I mentioned it at the time of Olympics and will keep saying the same thing, doesn’t matter if you are the greatest athlete in our country,’’ a fan posted.