No 400m track on Lakshadweep; just 2 weekly ships to reach mainland for competitions: youth nat’l heptathlon champion Mubbsina Mohammed’s story

When Lakshadweep’s Mubssina Mohammed won the long jump gold at the National Youth Championships on Sunday, her mom was over the moon. “Bhayngra, bhayngra (very, very) happy,” Dubina Bhanu said in a tone that matched the excitement of winning a World level medal. But for Mubssina, who comes from a place that doesn’t even have a 400m track, let alone a synthetic surface, the achievement is no mean feat.
A day after winning Lakshadweep’s first ever national-level athletics medal (long jump gold), 16-year-old Mubssina (4649 points) finished first in heptathlon at the ongoing Youth National Championships in Bhopal. The prodigious teenager has now qualified in both events for the Asian Youth Championships to be held in Kuwait next month.
Mubssina was first spotted coach Ahmed Jawad Hassan, a Lakshadweep Youth and Sports Affairs official and coach, during a sports festival in the Minicoy islands. The youngster was a middle- and long-dance runner back then. “She had the quality of a good long jumper and that is why I asked her to switch. She had that explosiveness in her strides,” says a proud Hassan who is also the secretary of the Lakshadweep athletics association.
Athletics is never a first choice among boys in football-loving Lakshadweep. The handful of youngsters that train under Hassan had to be coaxed into trying the sport. For women, it is a battle to convince their parents.
“The boys hardly show any interest. Even at zonal level events, only girls have won medals so far. But the biggest hurdle is convincing their parents to send them for training. Here the focus is entirely on studies and sports is often seen as a draction or a futile career path,” says Hassan.

Another hurdle is the lack of basic facilities. The 10 inhabited islands don’t have a single 400m or synthetic track. Mubssina and the others have to make do with mud tracks for their workout and training. High-end gymnasiums and other recovery facilities are dant dreams for Lakshadweep youngsters at the moment.
If infrastructure inadequacy wasn’t a hurdle big enough, the region also lacks personnel power in athletics. “I am the only athletics coach in the inhabited 10 islands here. I take care of coaching, paperwork, and organising events and have even done the markings at competitions. There is virtually no one to help me out here and barely any funds. I put money from my own pocket to organise competitions,” says Hassan who was a university-level middle-dance runner.
Out of the mainstream
But the biggest obstacle for athletes from the region remains travelling to competition venues. The weekly ship from Kavaratti, the capital of the union territory, is the only viable option for youngsters to travel to the mainland. “The only major competition we have here is the school games. For the rest, we have to travel. Since we have one or maximum two ships from here to Ernakulam in a week, we have to spare at least a week to travel and return from any competition,” explains the coach.

There were 7 ships earlier and now playing between Kavaratti and Indian mainland. Now, only two are operating. There are no fixed days. The ship arrival dates are announced two or three days in advance and tickets are released online. So a ship from Kochi that will leave on 20th had its tickets released on 18th. Just travelling to a national competition is an almighty event for any potential athlete from Lakshadweep.
“That is one of the reasons parents don’t want their kids to do athletics. They feel all this travel will ruin their schooling.”

But Mubssina’s mother, in her own words “thinks differently.” Dubina Bano is very passionate about any kind of sport. As a kid, she wanted to pursue sports herself but her parents did not approve. “It is the case now also. I see so many parents refusing to send their kids to sports but I think differently. I am very, very happy that my daughter has won the first medal from this region. I really hope it will change the outlook of people now,” says Dubina who runs a small clothing store in Minicoy.
Mubssina’s father does not have fixed employment and the family is dependent on Dubina’s earnings. “She is her biggest supporter and fan. They have limited financial resources but her mother never lets that affect Mubssina’s sport,” says Hassan.
Deepika rewrites javelin record
Meanwhile, Deepika of Bangaon, Haryana, rewrote her own Youth(U-18) national record with a best effort of 51.84m (previous mark 51.37m) in the javelin throw. The teenager, who was the only thrower to breach the 50m mark on Monday, also achieved the cut for the event in Kuwait. Deepika is also the national record holder in the U-16 category and trains under coach Hanuman, who is credited for producing several young and promising talents from the Fatehabad region.