Tripura BJP MP Biplab Kumar Deb Sunday said the erstwhile Left Front government did not help gymnast Dipa Karmakar when she needed their support to participate in an international event.
Inaugurating a football tournament at Kumarghat in Unakoti district, Deb said, “Tripura girl Dipa Karmakar faced some problems during selection in an international gymnastics event, but the current CPI(M) state secretary (Jitendra Chaudhury), who was then the chairman of a sports organisation, did not help her.”
Karmakar later got the opportunity to participate in the said tournament, after the intervention of former Assam chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal and other BJP leaders, he added.
Thereafter, the former Tripura chief minister described the CPI(M) as an ‘emergency party’.
“Swami Vivekananda advised the youth to go to the playground. But the communists aimed to misguide the youth by making them participate in rallies. They never wanted welfare for Tripura and its people,” said Deb.
Karmakar won a bronze medal in the vault category at the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games. Next year, she won another bronze medal at the Asian Championships.
She scripted history by becoming the first Indian woman gymnast to qualify for the final vault event at the 2016 Rio Olympics. Karmakar, however, missed an Olympic bronze medal by a whisker.
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She went on to win a gold medal at the 2018 Artistic Gymnastics World Cup in Turkey. Karmakar was later honoured with the Padma Shri, the Arjuna award, and the Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna award for her achievements in sports.
She announced her retirement from sports last year and expressed her interest in coaching budding gymnasts.
