Page 3 Profile: Madhura Nagendra, olympic interloper

 

Monday 30 July 2012 05:54 EDT
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Who's that girl?

That was the question on everyone's lips when an unknown woman gate-crashed the Indian team's lap of the Olympic Stadium during the opening ceremony on Friday night. Dressed in turquoise jeans and a red jacket, she made no attempt to blend in with the delegation, going so far as to march alongside the flag-bearer.

Sounds a bit dangerous

Indian officials certainly think so. Their press attaché, Harpal Singh Bedi, said the incident was "definitely a security lapse". But Sebastian Coe played down concerns, telling reporters the interloper was simply "a cast member who clearly got slightly over-excited".

So the mystery's been solved?

Sort of. Indian newspapers named the woman as Madhura Nagendra, a graduate student from Bangalore who now lives in London. According to the paper, Nagendra – who goes by the name of Madhura Honey on her Facebook account – had posted photos of her Olympic passes online prior to the ceremony.

What now?

The Indian delegation's acting chef de mission, Brig PK Muralidharan Raja, said his team had submitted a letter "expressing our strongest resentment on the matter" to organisers but were waiting for a response. Coe said that games officials would be having their own discussions about the incident.

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