‘Lost my Asian Games medal to transgender woman’: Athlete Swapna Barman’s stunning charge

New Delhi: Indian athlete Swapna Barman sparked off a major controversy on Monday, with her stunning allegations against Bronze medalist in the women’s Hepatathlon event in the ongoing Asian Games 2023.

Swapna finished at fourth spot in the Heptathlon event in the ongoing games and narrowly missed out winning the bronze medal.

The bronze medal in the event was bagged by another Indian athlete Nandini Agasara who gathered a total of 5712 points. Swapna’s total stood at 5708 points.

However today, she took to social media and claimed that her chance of winning bronze medal was ruled out because of ineligible ‘transgender’ woman.

Barman’s explosive charge created a furore on social media and even left the organizers baffled.
For the unversed, Swapna was the defending champion of Heptathlon event. She had won gold medal in Jakarta Asian Games in 2018.

Taking to X (formerly Twitter), Swapna Barman also sought support & assistance of people in ‘exposing’ the ‘illegal & unjust’ awarding of medal to transgender woman.

Swapna didn’t mention Nandini’s name but as latter was the bronze medalist, her allegations were directed at her. However, minutes later, she later deleted her X post.

“I have lost my Asian Games bronze medal to a transgender women at the 19th Asian Games held in Hangzhou,China. I want my medal back as it is against the rules of our Athletics. Help me and support me please,” Swapna wrote.

In the Haptathlon event of Asian Games 2023, China’s Ninali Zheng bagged the gold medal with 6149 points while Uzbekistan’s Ekaterina Voronima came second.