Youth nationals sans medals on Day 1

Panaji: “Kaam karo fal ki iccha bad me karo” (Perform your duty, expect the fruits of labour later on) could well be the tagline for the 12th National Youth Athletics Championship, at least on Day I of the meet, which got under way here at the Bambolim Athletics stadium on Thursday.
Around 30 athletes, will have to wait at least till Friday to lay their hands on the gold, silver and bronze medals that they won on the opening day, thanks the Athletics Federation of India’s lethargic or rather, lack-a-daisical approach who waited until the enth hour to get the medals couriered a day before the start of the meet.
To add insult to injury, the cargo division of Air India played the devil’s role by misplacing the entire consignment on its way from Delhi to Goa on Wednesday.
“The agency, which was responsible for sending the medals, dispatched the package only yesterday. But the medals never reached Goa. We are monitoring the situation with the AI cargo and will head to their office in the evening to find out what went wrong. Hopefully, by tomorrow morning, the medals will be with us,” AFI general secretary CK Valson told TOI when contacted.
“The event was originally scheduled for Pune, but due to unavoidable circumstances, it was moved to Goa. I have to check with the medals manufacturers, why they took so long, but I presume, they inscribed ‘Pune’ on the medals, but since the event was shifted to Goa, they had to come up with fresh medals,” added Valson.
In contrast, the Goa Athletic Association general secretary Paresh Kamat, as a cover-up, said the medals ceremony was not scheduled for the opening day and was planned only to be given out on day two of the event, a rarity for any event, forget a national one.
What is not understood is, why did the AFI not make the necessary arrangements ahead of time, especially when they knew of the change in venue over a month ago.
It is learnt that Air India Flight No. 867, which was travelling from Delhi to Goa on April 15 (Wednesday), took off with the medals but the bill No. 14377591 -- read ‘1 PIECES MISSING GOI’ -- until late on Thursday evening, when TOI tracked the cargo movement on the airline’s official website.