Pak woman athelete Naseem wins gold in South Asia Games

Karachi: For a nation still upset at the national cricket team`s disastrous performance in Australia, a 22-year-old female athlete`s performance in the South Asian games has come as a big morale booster. Naseem Hameed, the daughter of a daily wage earner from Karachi, has captured the imagination of the Pakistani people by becoming the first Pakistani woman to win the 100 metres race in the regional games in Dhaka. Naseem clocked a time of 11.81 seconds to earn the tag of the fastest woman in South Asia winning an unlikely gold for her country. "It was my dream to win a gold medal for my country and I am delighted it has come in such a big event," Naseem said from Dhaka where she is still celebrating her win. The young woman`s success is all the more inspiring as she comes from a very poor background. Her family lives in a 40 square yard house in the lower middle class locality of Korangi which has produced few athletes. Her father makes a living by working as a mason on daily wages. "She is our main bread earner as she gets a salary of 9000 rupees from the Pakistan army because of her athletic skills," her father Hameed said. Despite their poor background, Naseem`s family have always encouraged her to be a top athlete and is also supporting her younger sister, who is a member of the Sindh provincial football team. Naseem said that she is happy over her achievement because she hopes it would inspire other young women in Pakistan to pursue a career in sports. "In our country no one really takes women`s sports seriously but I am hoping my feat will inspire other young women to also take sports more seriously and work harder towards a goal," Naseem said. The athlete said she had worked hard and trained strenuously for the last four months in preparation for the South Asian games. "I am just happy that all my hard work has paid off and a lot of credit goes to Pakistan army who provided me with a proper coach and facilities for training," she said. PTI