This Is What You Can Do To Send India¡¯s Fastest Wheelchair Half-Marathoner To The 2020 Tokyo Paralympics
With your help he could go on to do India proud.
Shailesh Kumar is India's fastest wheelchair half-marathoner and his dream is to represent India at the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics.
But now the man needs to raise funds to participate in the big event.
FuelADream.com
He had clocked 2 hours 20 minutes and 16 seconds at the Chennai Marathon last year and now is aiming for greater things.
The man is an all-rounder as far as sports in concerned. He takes part in half-marathon, full marathon and wheelchair basketball. To top all that he is an Inclusion Trainer at the Chandigarh Spinal Rehab.
But the man's journey has not been an easy one.
Hailing from a small village in Gaya, Bihar, his world was shattered when at the age of 17, he suffered a spinal injury after falling while celebrating victory in a football match. This left him paralysed from 2011 onwards.
FuelADream.com
But this did not deter him. He worked hard and was admitted to the Mary Verghese Institute of Rehabilitation, Christian Medical College Vellore. It was here that S Vaidyanathan, the co-founder of Ganga Trust, a self-help group for persons with spinal cord injuries, who encouraged him to take up sports.
Kumar is grateful to Vaidyanathan for giving him a dream to chase.
He has competed in several races and now has a target to take part in the Paralympics. As of now he is raising funds through crowdfunding on a platform FuelADream.com. He needs to get enough money to buy a customised marathon wheelchair. It will cost him around Rs 4 lakh. If the campaign is successful, he will be India's first athlete to use a modern customised wheelchair for a sporting event.
FuelADream.com
So how can you help? Simple, just contribute. The cause is good and it is to help one of our athletes do us proud on the big stage. Imagine the joy it would bring to our faces if he actually won a medal at the Paralympics!
You can send your contributions here.