Natl Games gold medalist crusades on wheels

Kolkata, Feb 13 (UNI) Four National Games awards, a life of penury and several false assurances later, Mahadev Khashaba Patil is a crusader on wheels relating the plight of the handicapped in this country.

Mahadev Khashaba Patil has polio in his right leg. But the handicap has not deterred the 39-year-old farmer from Gudhe village in Patan Taluk of Satara district of Maharashtra from undertaking a nationwide tour on two wheels.

''There is no respect for human life and dignity here in this country,'' Patil said, hurt by repeated false hopes.

''My message to everyone is not to gift us wheelchairs or crutches on World Handicap Day on December three. Give us opportunities. Our brain and other faculties work as well as any other people,'' Patil told UNI.

Mahadev, who left home, on November 25 last year is here to meet Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and Governor Gopal Krishna Gandhi.

However, while the former is busy with Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi, the latter has Nobel Laureate Mohammad Yunus as his guest.

Strange though is the fact that while Prodi's delegation is trying to develop industries at grassroots level to raise the living standard in West Bengal, Yunus's Grameen Bank deals only with the poorest of the poor.

Poor he is and helpless too.

''I grow a seasonal crop of Jowar and sell caps and juice in summer and umbrellas in monsoon to run my livelihood. Its meagre day-to-day subsistance,'' Patil says.

''I did not get any sponsor. I dont need it. I am cutting the money out of my own pocket. But I have a mission to complete. I am going to different states trying to meet the Ministers and tell them about the plight of the handicaps.

''It may not make any difference, but I will raise a voice today, someone will do it another day. Someday we all will wake up. Help never reaches the handicapped people in the rural areas. I want to raise a voice for them,'' he said.

Patil, who took part in the National Games for the Physically Challenged in 1994 and 2000, has four medals for his efforts. In 1994 he won golds in five km cycling, 100 mts and 200 mts sprint and in 2000 in 50 mts freestyle swimming.

He had calls from China and Bangkok to take part at the Asian level, but a lack of sponsorship had left those dreams crestfallen.

Patil has toured Goa, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and is now in West Bengal. And his mode of transport for the 6,400 km he has covered has been an ordinary bicycle.

He left home with three sets of clothes and Rs 10,000. He admits that though the administrations in some of the states have not been very kind to him, the common people have helped him with food and shelter.

This is not the first time he is cycling for a cause. In 1999, he had pedalled all the way to New Delhi to meet the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. He had to sit on a fast to get an audience.

''The government has made so many policies for the challenged, like pension schemes and bank loan facilities. But none of these is percolating to the interiors of the country. I once tried getting a job, but failed,'' says Mahadev.

''I have met three Chief Ministers of Maharashtra Sharad Pawar, Chaggan Bhujbal and Vilas Rao Deshmukh. Mr Deshmukh even flagged off my current rally. But no one does anything to provide a permanent solution to my plight,'' he said.

Patil, who heads for Patna from here, will cover 21,000 kms in total before culminating his journey in Maharashtra.

UNI