For a good cause

For a national player, selected amongst all junior basketball playing boys in the country at the national training camp in preparation of the upcoming Asian championship, Lokesh Sharma is quite an anomaly. With only six months of basketball training behind him, he has already broken into Chhattisgarh's U-16 team, and now has a shot at wearing the India colours.

While his towering height of 7ft is of great help, but it is with perseverance in face of odds that the sixteen-year-old has managed to find a place in the squad of top 30 players billed to represent the country at Vietnam.

His time away from the game shows. Lokesh, called Lucky by his friends, struggles through most of the drills, while his fellow teammates look to enhance their performance by cutting seconds from the stopclock that measures time taken to complete drills.

As a twelve-year-old he started playing basketball at a local ground in Kolkata, he was spotted by Pawan Tiwari, a former Chhattisgarh player. Pawan asked him to give a trial at Raghvendra Singh Gaur’s academy in Bhilai. But his father, Shambu Prasad Sharma, who works for the local garment store, reluctantly agreed to send him to Bhilai. "For tall players its difficult to do push ups and bend low. He managed to do both with some difficulty," recalled RS Gaur, who also Lokesh to shift to Bhilai pemanently and also offered to sponsor his lodging.

Just when it seemed like Lokesh's career was going to take off it came the unexpected halt. He was ordered back home by his father, who wanted Lokesh to help him to help out with the livelihood. Disappointed at the turn of events he frittered time watching TV and roaming with friends. For almost two years he did not step on to the court and broke all his contacts with the game. But he deeply missed the energy and the adrenalin rush of the game.

He again broached the topic of playing the game to his parents. The polite requests turned into a teenage rebellion when he refused to speak with or accompany his father anywhere. "It was my cousin's wedding, a big family occasion. I refused to be a part of it. When my dad questioned me I replied ‘if you won't let me go where I want I won't go where you want’, " he said.

That settled the argument , with some backing from Pawan he once again went for trials at Bhilai. In April this year he started training at the academy. After a month of preparation he travelled with the Chhattisgarh team for the Basketball Youth Nationals. It was here he achieved his biggest victory. Watching him play live on TV and win a bronze medal, his father finally conceded that his son had made the right decision and promised to give him full support.