Santhi Soundarajan (also spelled Shanthi Soundararajan, born 17 April 1981) is a track and field athlete from Tamil Nadu, India. She is the winner of 12 international medals for India and around 50 medals for her home state of Tamil Nadu. Shanthi Soundarajan is the first Tamil woman to win a medal at the Asian Games. She competes in middle distance track events. She was stripped of a silver medal won at the 2006 Asian Games after failing a sex verification test which disputed her eligibility to participate in the women's competition.
Early life and career
Santhi was born in 1981 in the village of Kathakkurichi in the Pudukkottai District of Tamil Nadu, India. Santhi grew up in a 20-by-5-foot hut across the road from the new home she lives in now. There was no bathroom or outhouse, nor was there running water or electricity. She is one of five children of brick-kiln labourers in a rural village in southern Tamil Nadu state; she overcame malnutrition as a child to become a middle-distance runner. Her family could not even afford a television and watched Santhi's Doha race at a neighbour's house. Her mother and father had to go to another town to work in a brickyard, where they earned the American equivalent of $4 a week. While they were gone, Santhi, the oldest, was in charge of taking care of her four siblings. Sometimes, Santhi's grandfather, an accomplished runner, helped while her parents were away. When she was 13, he taught her to run on an open stretch of dirt outside the hut and bought her a pair of shoes.
At her first competition, in eighth grade, Santhi won a tin cup trophy; she collected 13 more in interschool competitions. The sports coach at a nearby high school took note of her performances and recruited her. The school paid her tuition and provided her with a uniform and hot lunches. It was the first time Santhi had ever eaten three meals a day.
After high school, Santhi got a scholarship from an Arts college in Pudukkottai, the nearest town. and the following year, Santhi transferred to a college in Chennai, the state's capital, which was seven hours away. In 2005, she attended the Asian Athletics Championships in South Korea, where she won a silver medal. In 2006, she was chosen to represent India at the Asian Games (run by the Olympic Council of Asia). In the 800 meters, Santhi took the silver in 2 minutes, 3.16 seconds, beating Viktoriya Yalovtseva of Kazakhstan by 0.03 seconds. This win led to Santhi becoming embroiled in an ongoing, unresolved debate over what makes an athlete eligible to compete in the women's division.
In 2004 Santhi was awarded 1 lakh cash from then Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa.
Santhi holds the national record for the women's 3000 metres steeplechase clocking 10:44.65 seconds. At a national meet in Bangalore in July 2005, she won the 800m, 1,500m and 3000m. She won the silver medal in 800 m at the 2005 Asian Championships in Incheon, South Korea.
Asian Games controversy
Santhi won a silver medal in the women's 800m race at the 2006 Asian Games held in Doha, Qatar clocking 2 minutes, 3.16 seconds.
However, she underwent a sex test shortly afterwards, and the results indicated that she "does not possess the sexual characteristics of a woman". While such sex tests are not compulsory for competitors, the International Association of Athletics Federations can request that contenders take such tests at any time, and include intensive evaluation by a gynecologist, a geneticist, an endocrinologist, a psychologist, and an internal medicine specialist. Reports initially suggested that her upbringing in impoverished rural India, where she reportedly only started eating proper meals in 2004, could be a factor behind the test result. In a 2016 video petition, Santhi Soundarajan disclosed that she has been told she has androgen insensitivity syndrome.
Five days after the news report, Santhi says, she received a call from Lalit Bhanot, a former joint secretary of the Indian Olympic Association. Bhanot spoke to Santhi in English. "He told Santhi she can't do sports anymore,'. When she asked why, she was told: It's been confirmed, Santhi cannot compete in sports." Soon after the results of the sex test came out, she was stripped of her silver medal.
Santhi returned to her village in humiliation and promptly fell into serious depression. Months later, she tried to kill herself by ingesting a type of poison used by veterinarians. A friend found her vomiting uncontrollably and took her to a hospital.