No respect for national athletes: TTE throws India's top pole-vaulter off train; video sparks controversy

In a shocking video, a Travelling Ticket Examiner (TTE) at the Panvel station in Mumbai harassed a national record holder in men’s pole vault, Dev Meena, asking him to deboard a train. The video of the same has gone viral on the internet, where Meena talks about facing harassment at the hands of an Indian Railways official. However, Meena wasn’t the only one at the receiving end, as his fellow pole vaulter and top athlete, Kuldeep Yadav, was also harassed by the TTE, who told the two athletes that they were not allowed to carry their poles inside the train.

An India Today report claims that Meena and Yadav were stranded at the Panvel station for nearly five hours trying to explain to the Railway authorities that the poles were essential equipment for their sport. Both were returning to their base after competing at the All India Inter-University Championships.

Meanwhile, NNIS, a sports platform, shared the full video of the incident on their social media handle, where Meena questioned the Railway authorities about their treatment of the junior athletes.

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Know more about Dev Meena!

Dev Meena is an Indian pole vaulter from Madhya Pradesh, who broke his national record with a 5.35m effort at the National Federation Senior Athletics Championships in April last year.

Meena, who was 19 years old at that time, dominated the men’s pole vault event, bettering his earlier national record of 5.32m, which he registered during the Uttarakhand National Games in February.

Meanwhile, pole vault remains one of those sports where the Indians are trying to enter the elite league. More of a European sport, the Asian record in the men’s pole vault is 6m (by Ernest John Obiena of the Philippines in 2023); however, the world record in this discipline belongs to Sweden’s Armand Duplantis (6.27m).