Narsingh Pancham Yadav

Personal life and family

Narsingh Yadav is the son of Pancham Yadav and Bhulna Devi from eastern Uttar Pradesh. Narsingh and his brother Vinod both lived with their father Pancham, a milk distributor in Mumbai, while his mother lived in the Neema village in Varanasi district, where she looked after farming in their 2 bigha land. Both the brothers became wrestlers. Yadav has been training since he was 13 and is currently a resident of suburban Jogeshwari in Mumbai. Narsingh is a DSP with the Maharashtra Government.

Career

He won a gold medal in the Asian championships, in freestyle 74 kg, in 2010.

2010 Commonwealth Games

At the Games held at home in New Delhi, India, Narsingh Yadav was a last-minute replacement and competed in the men's freestyle 74 kg category.

He managed to surprise everyone and won the gold medal, beating Richard Brian Addinall of South Africa in the gold medal bout.

2011 Commonwealth Championship

In Melbourne, Australia, Narsingh finished second in the Commonwealth Championship and won the silver medal, losing in the final bout to Cleopas Ncube of Canada.

2012 Olympics

At the Olympics in London, Narsingh Yadav lost his opening bout against Matt Gentry of Canada in the 74 kg freestyle event and was knocked out of the tournament.

2014 Asian Games

In the Round of 16 in Incheon, South Korea, Narsingh lost 1:3 to Rashid Kurbanov of Uzbekistan. With the Uzbek grappler qualifying for the final, Narsingh was able to compete for a medal through the repechage round where he first faced Ramazan Kambarov of Turkmenistan and beat him 4:1. In the bronze medal bout, he was successful in securing the bronze medal with a 3:1 win over Daisuke Shimada of Japan.

In honour of his bronze medal, Narsingh, along with Seema Punia was awarded a cash prize of Rs 50 lakh by the state government of Uttar Pradesh.

2015–present

At the 2015 Asian Wrestling Championships, Yadav, who has been included in the 74 kg category in the absence of double-Olympic medalist Sushil Kumar, lost to Daisuke Shimada of Japan 9–12 in the qualification round, but qualified for the repechage round after the latter reached the final. In his repechage bout, he defeated Byungmin Kong of South Korea 15–4 to enter the bronze-medal play-off. He bagged 3–1 classification points to outplay Zhiger Zakirov of Kazakhstan and won the bronze medal.

Competing at the 2015 World Championships in Las Vegas, Yadav won 3:1 in the first round over Hanoch Rachamin of Israel. His next opponent was Soener Demirtas of Turkey whom he beat 3:1. In the third round, Narsingh was up against Livan Lopez Azcuy of Cuba and won 4:1. In the fourth round, he lost 3:1 to Unurbat Purevjav of Mongolia. This allowed him to contest for the bronze medal bout which he won a comfortable 5:0 over Zelimkhan Khadjiev of France.

The bronze medal bout made news across India not just for his spectacular comeback but also because of one particular move – the 'Dhak' move used in dangals or local wrestling clubs across India. Yadav's assistant coach Jagmal Singh who had coached Yadav for ten years recounted, "It’s called Dhak. It’s a showboating wrestling move that people use on mud-courts during big village-based tournaments. It's a crowd pleaser. But very difficult to pull off accurately."

2016 Olympics controversy

Having won bronze at the World Championships qualified Yadav to the 2016 Rio Olympics but Sushil Kumar who had missed the 2016 Rio Olympics qualification event due to injury in which Narsingh secured the berth for India asked for a trial between himself and Narsingh and moved the Delhi High Court and only after his appeal was rejected that it was confirmed that Narsingh was going to the 2016 Rio Olympics. However, he failed two anti-doping tests, conducted on 25 June and 5 July 2016, testing positive for metandienone, which he asserted was to "sabotage" his chances of competing at the Olympics, following which he was given a clean chit by NADA. The World Anti-Doping Agency challenged the decision and moved the Court of Arbitration for Sport, and a day prior to his first bout at the Olympics, on 18 August 2016, he was handed a four-year ban by the latter.

Pro Wrestling League

For the inaugural edition of the Pro Wrestling League, Narsingh was bought by the Bangalore franchise, owned by JSW Sport, during the auction conducted in New Delhi. The World Championship bronze medallist was the marquee player picked up by the Bangalore franchise for Rs 34.5 lakh.

The Pro Wrestling League is scheduled to kick off from 10 December till 27 December.

Felicitations and awards

During the legendary Pele's visit to India to attend the final of the Subroto Cup, Narsingh was invited to a special dinner hosted by the organisers of the Subroto Cup and felicitated for his contributions to the sport of wrestling in India.

Other titles

Controversy

Yadav is likely to face an enquiry, after which a decision will be taken on whether to extend his training or dismiss him. On 6 June 2016, Narsingh Yadav was virtually eligible for the Rio Olympics after the trial request by Sushil Kumar was rejected by the High court.

On 25 June Narsingh Provisionally failed dope test which made the wrestlers chances of going to Rio Olympics more bleak. Just within 10 days, the wrestler failed a second dope test which was conducted on 5 July. Although NADA cleared him from dope test failure, WADA did not confirm on his clean chit even till 16 August 2016, with wrestling event starting in Rio on 14 August. He has been banned for 4 years and debarred from the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro by the Court of Arbitration for Sport after the World Anti-Doping Agency appealed against the decision of the National Anti-Doping Agency to allow him to compete even after he failed a doping test testing positive for anabolic steroids . It is believed popularly and claimed that the doping saga was a sabotage by a rival group bent upon preventing him from participating in the Olympics 2016.