Run with Roshni for Gorkha identity in Mumbai Marathon 2013

Twenty marathon runners from the Darjeeling hills and Sikkim will take part in the Mumbai Marathon 2013 on January 20,thanks to the untiring effort of Roshni Rai, an amateur marathoner who is a corporate lawyer by profession, whose dream is to produce an Olympian from her neck of the woods. Rosni, who hails from Pedong, about 20 kms from here, had helped 23 runners from the region take part in the 1912 edition of the same event earlier this year. Following the success of the last marathon where the runners ran to highlight Indian identity of the Gorkhas, Rosni is facilitating the participation of the 20 marathoners under her “Run with Rosni” banner to showcase the potential of athletes from
the hills.

Roshni said the performance of the some of the runners in the last marathon and an article she read on the long distance runners of Kenya were the inspiration behind her “Run with Rosni” initiative.  “Prabal Chettri ran the 21km half-marathon in 1 hour 16 minutes, finishing 11th  out of 14,000 runners last time. Since he was running the official marathon for the first time, he was put in the ‘D’ category which meant he was behind10,000 runners in the starting line. To come 11th from the position was very creditable,” she said, adding: “I am very clear if we give proper support to runners like Prabal, who is in the right age group of 19-20 years, we could see them representing India in the Olympics in four years time.”

Prabal will be running the half-marathon in the next Mumbai run as well. So will the 16 others from the region, while the remaining three will run the full marathon. “What struck me most about the article I
read on the Kenyan long-distance runners was the idea of having a running culture. Just like the Kenyan, especially the Kalenjin tribe, runners, we also come from high altitude, but there is no running culture in our community. We must develop the culture of running,”she said. 

To promote the culture of running, Rosni had organized a marathon event in the Kalimpong sub-division last year, where her running mates from different parts of the country had participated. 31-year-old Rosni is into the amateur sport of ultra-marathon, which is longer than the traditional 42-km marathon. Her last major international run was the Comrades Marathon (also dubbed the Ultimate Human Race) where she covered the distance of 89 kms in 11 hours 50 minutes and 26 seconds.

Given that the runners from the hills cannot afford to meet either the registration fee for the marathon or the travel and boarding expenses, Rosni takes the help of her colleagues and friends to raise the fund.“I have collected Rs 1 lakh from my colleagues to sponsor the 20 runners. The registration fee is Rs 900 for runners with valid timing certificates from previous marathons and Rs 6,000 for runners without timing certificates. Out of the 20 runners from the hills, 10 each have been registered under either category,” she said.

By Mukesh Sharma