Hockey player Walmiki returns to India after 4 months in Netherlands

Devindar Walmiki was yearning to return to India, but had no real plans as such. Stuck in the Netherlands to play their hockey league—which was suspended in March—for premier division club HGC since February, Walmiki did not mind being in a country with more safety and relaxations than India at present.

However, a personal family issue forced him to change his mind and come back home, after all. On Thursday evening, the 28-year-old took off in a direct Amsterdam-Mumbai Air India flight operating under the special Vande Bharat Mission to fly back Indians stuck abroad during this pandemic. Walmiki landed in Mumbai at 5.30am on Friday, and has since checked into The Lalit hotel for a seven-day quarantine stay as mandated by the Maharashtra government.

“There, I got used to living a life without masks. After landing here, I am realising how completely different it is. I have been wearing mask, face shield and what not,” Walmiki, who was part of India’s 2016 Rio Olympics squad, said.

He has had to shell out a lot of money to be able to return home—the flight and hotel stay is no cheap deal—let alone abide by the quarantine rules of the state government. But getting to spend time with family after a long wait, even though not in ideal circumstances, compensates for those challenges.

“Compared to India, things are far better in Holland. I was able to train there and everything was going well. But unfortunately I had to come down due to a problem in the family,” Walmiki said.

So sudden was the decision that Walmiki booked the ticket for his evening flight only at 10am the same day. It helped that he had been in touch with the Indian embassy in The Hague since the lockdown days, and that the Ambassador of India to the Netherlands, Venu Rajamony, would often watch their club’s league games from the stands and knew Walmiki personally.

Midfielder Walmiki, along with India’s 2016 Junior World Cup-winning captain Harjeet Singh, were signed up by HGC for their 2019-20 season last year. Walmiki flew back to join the club in February. The league was suspended and eventually called off in April due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Along with Singh and several other overseas players from Australia, Argentina, Japan and France, he stayed put in a big apartment in Wassenaar, a suburb in The Hague. Apart from physical workout sessions in his apartment, Walmiki resorted to writing daily notes, reading books, cooking a variety of new dishes and conducting online classes for some budding players in Mumbai under Merzban Patel, Walmiki’s childhood coach.

“The period was enriching; just being with myself and learning things which I never thought I would be able to do. I would write down my thoughts every day and read books. I also did online sessions with many of Bawa sir’s students and other budding players, helping them on how to train and workout at home,” Walmiki said.

By April, Walmiki and others were permitted to do outdoor exercises and in May, he was back on the hockey turf training by himself and soon with his teammates. Just when things normalised in his temporary home, Walmiki was forced to return to Mumbai, where no outdoor sporting activity has been allowed yet.

Walmiki has to fly back to the Netherlands next month to join his club in preparations for the next season, set to begin from early September. He hopes international flights resume by then. “Else, I will have to take a special flight again. I have to be back there anyhow,” he said.