“I have done this so that the Chief Minister can decide whether tomorrow’s felicitation function should be held as scheduled or postponed. There is no news of Santhi yet,” Rajkumar said, pointing out that the athlete had won medals at the Asian Championship and the South Asian Federation Games in Sri Lanka earlier this year but the question of putting her through a “gender test” was never raised.

A shocked P Nagarajan, Santhi’s chief coach and founder member of the Prime Sports Academy, who was instrumental in providing her training when she received no financial assistance from the state government or private sources, told reporters that the report, if true, would be a “big blow to us”. Flooded with calls from the media, Nagarajan said he had taken Santhi under his wings “on humanitarian grounds”.

The Academy as well as Santhi’s village had celebrated her win at the Doha Games. “If the reports are true, then it is indeed very sad and extremely disappointing,” he said.