Missing athlete still at large

Father says female participant went to Lahore for athletics event.

LAHORE:

The case of the missing female athlete, who reportedly participated in the 43rd National Athletics Championship, has turned into a mystery as the Athletic Federation of Pakistan (AFP) ruled out there was an athlete with that name in the event.

The athlete, who hails from Azad Kashmir, told her parents that she was going to Lahore to take part in the national championships and has gone missing since then.

Family fails to reach her

Her father, Haji Mohammad Khan, has made numerous unsuccessful attempts to find her but failed each time.

The father claims that his daughter had been participating in various athletics events in the past, with one of the recent ones being the National Championship held in Peshawar last year.

Federation unaware of her participation

However, AFP Secretary Khalid Mehmood denied having her name in any of the records for the recently-concluded event.

“This is very strange as the reported name was never in our list of participants in any contingent,” Mehmod told The Express Tribune.

“It’s highly unlikely that a participant from Azad Kashmir would feature for Sindh. However, just for the satisfaction of her parents, we cross-checked the name in the list of all the departments and provinces and unfortunately her name wasn’t in any of our records.”

He also added that since the clerical staff was on holidays since Thursday, he could only manage to get the recent championship records. Mehmood said that if the case demanded more records then that will take time as they will have to wait for the staff to return.

Meanwhile, the issue has also been taken up by the director general of the Punjab Sports Board, who, after thorough inspection, has not been able to find any trace either.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 24^th, 2011.