London Olympics bronze medallist MC Mary Kom is now a Superintendent of Police (Sports) as the Manipur government promoted her. Along with the promotion the government also increased the prize money from Rs 50 lakhs to 75 lakhs, says a report in the Hindustan Times.
The decision to increase the cash award was taken in a cabinet meeting. Other Olympians from Manipur, L Devendro Singh (Boxing), L Bombayla Devi (Archery) and Ng Soniya Chanu (Weightlifting) will get a cash prize of Rs 21 lakhs along with a government job according to their qualification.
Meanwhile, Mary Kom is still a bit disappointed that she could not win the gold medal for the country, says a report in The Times of India.
“I am very happy to be the first Indian woman boxer to get a bronze medal but I am sad that I could not convert it into gold. I don’t know what happened during my semifinal bout. My body was not moving the way I would have liked and I felt as if I could not do anything. I was very much confused”, said Mary.
Mary who lost to Nicola Adams in the semifinals said, “I never get nervous before bouts but that day I don’t know what was happening to me. I can’t even explain it. I was not attacking as much and may be it was the crowd also which was cheering Nicola. I generally don’t get affected by how the crowd is behaving but probably in the semifinals, it affected me.”
But overall Mary is happy with her performance, she said, “I think I have achieved everything that I dreamt of. Of course I wanted a gold medal at the Olympics but I am happy with the bronze too because I am the first Indian woman boxer to get it.”
