Let Them Play

IN THE WEEKS ahead of the Asian Games at Hangzhou, Sports Minister Anurag Thakur held several meetings with officials and sport federations to review India’s preparations for the prestigious event and to assess what could be achievable targets in various disciplines. After all, it did seem possible to improve the final rankings. In certain events, there were medal prospects, which when added up, began to look enticing. “When I first spoke of 100 medals, many did not take me seriously. How could we achieve a 50 per cent improvement in our tally, they asked,” Thakur told Open, recalling the run-up to the sporting gala. As it turned out, at 107 medals, India exceeded the 100-medal target, and the improvement over the 2018 Jakarta Games exceeded 50 per cent. The “Abki bar, sau par [This time, we will cross 100]” slogan created an instant buzz, with celebrity endorsements rais­ing the pitch. Some commentators wondered if the target was an overreach but the slogan set the stage for the pyrotechnics that unfolded in Hangzhou where the Indian anthem played more often than at any previous Asiad with 28 golds, a tally not too far behind third-placed South Korea’s 42.

It might have been a leap of faith but was not a bridge too far. Medals began to flow and as the marquee track events began, India had won three medals in no time. Indian middle-distance runner Harmilan Bains, who works with the Reserve Bank of India, scored silvers in the 800m and 1,500m, fulfilling the prom­ise she has shown through vastly improved timings over the past three years. The difference, she told the media, was a coach who combined smart thinking with hard work. Intelligent coaching made the difference for hurdler Vithya Ramraj and her twin Nithya with the former finishing with two medals. Vithya equalled the long-held 400m hurdles record set by the legendary PT Usha in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics where the “Payyoli Express” missed a podium finish by 1/100th of a second. As president of the Indian Olympic Association, Usha, who is also a Rajya Sabha MP, might have felt a weight off her back. Honours came India’s way with Armyman Avinash Sa­ble’s gold in the 3,000m steeplechase. Parul Chaudhary’s silver in the 3,000m steeplechase and gold in the 5,000m were hard fought, but visuals of Preeti Lamba clutching her bronze as she shared the podium for the steeplechase race showed how much it meant for the fuel pump attendant’s daughter. Later, Chaud­hary told the media that she had wanted a medal as it would guarantee her promotion as a deputy superintendent of police. A grateful nation will bestow her with much more. The diver­sity of India’s medal winners, with many hailing from smaller towns and modest backgrounds, shows how opportunities for Indian sportspersons have grown. Archer Ojas Deotale, who won three golds (two in team events), is from Nagpur and trained in Satara. His high scores are not a surprise—he beat his Polish rival by shooting a perfect 150 in the finals of the World Archery Championships just ahead of the Asian Games. His other fellow trainee at Satara? Seventeen-year-old Aditi Swami held her nerve in India’s team gold medal win over Chinese Taipei where the two sides were on par till the last six arrows. Swami was also the youngest world champion ever at Berlin where Deotale hit his winning stride. Annu Rani, India’s first woman javelin gold medallist, recalled how just wearing a t-shirt and tracks was a challenge in her village of Bahadurpur in Meerut where female literacy, according to the 2011 Census, was less than 30 per cent.

The winning touch that saw Indian archers gather nine med­als in events like archery, where they have often faltered on the big stage, did not happen overnight. The Khelo India Games, the first edition of which was held in 2017, have begun to show results and this has widened the talent base and improved bench strength. Regular exposure to international events and top coaching abroad has seen Indian athletes take on Korean, Japanese and Chinese competitors without succumbing to stage fright. The going was not easy, as 24-year-old Indian hurdler Jyothi Yarraji found out when track officials inexplicably sought to disqualify her for a false start by Chinese star Wu Yanni in the lane next to her. Yarraji vehemently argued with officials till they reversed the decision though Wu was allowed to run, too, before being disqualified after the event following an Indian pro­test. As many as 124 of the 655 athletes who went to Hangzhou came through the Khelo India route, including Bains who made a mark in the inaugural event itself. The transition from uni­versity to the national and international stage is never easy, but every year youngsters are being selected for specialised support on the basis of their Khelo India performances. As many as 115 athletes in the Indian squad comprised TOPS (Target Olympic Podium Scheme) beneficiaries. The TOPS project categorises athletes as “core” and “development” and they are seen as medal prospects. Some of the notable successes include shuttler PV Sindhu and wrestler Sakshi Malik. The Mission Olympic Cell assists the TOPS programme—run by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports—and assesses the progress of individual elite athletes and also evaluates their requests related to training, which includes the selection of coaches and training venues. The requirements can even include special massage sessions at short notice to aid recovery from competitions and intense training. Former sports minister and 2004 Athens Olympics silver medallist Rajyavardhan Rathore, drawing from his own experience, facilitated a ₹50,000 a month allowance (₹25,000 for development athletes) so that sportspersons do not need to pres­ent bills and seek permissions for most routine requirements, whether a particular supplement or a casual expense.

A total of 156 foreign exposures were supported since De­cember 2022 and 285 athletes, including those who attended na­tional camps, received direct financial support while 72 training camps were held. A budget of ₹44 crore was sanctioned for TOPS athletes alone. Champion javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra has been based at Loughborough University in the UK and trained in Turkey and Finland. The weightlifters worked with a special­ised coach in the US, and Sable was under the wings of coach Scott Simons at Colorado Springs. Long jumper Sreeshankar Murali trained in Lucerne and Monaco and the gold-winning badminton doubles pair of Satwik and Chirag was coached by Dane Mathias Boe, who was the 2012 Olympic silver medallist. Boe was at hand to see the pair’s success and had a role in inject­ing the self-belief and acumen the Indians needed to overcome tough challenges from Malaysian and Korean teams. Though champion wrestler Bajrang Punia underperformed, he has been to Kyrgyzstan and Michigan. A young Indian equestrian team won a gold after 41 years and while horse riding is an elite sport, the Indian government provided more than ₹4 crore for transportation of horses to foreign locations. Close to 50 foreign experts were engaged in hockey, athletics, badminton, squash, chess, archery, shooting, rowing, boxing, basketball and football. Importantly, all athletes were evaluated on physiological, bio­chemical and psychological parameters through their training.

OFFICIALS POINT OUT that the concerted and well-planned interventions have the full backing of the govern­ment which has left it to professionals and federations to design specific programmes. The sports ministry does, however, monitor the progress of various teams and athletes in coordina­tion with federations, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi has regularly met Indian contingents after major sporting events. He has taken time to speak to teams who narrowly lost out as well and encouraged them to look ahead as he did after the In­dian women’s hockey team lost their bronze medal match at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, and the Indian women’s cricket team fell short by nine runs in the 2017 World Cup final. On October 10, he met the Indian Asian Games contingent, listened to their accounts, and asked them to train hard for the Paris Olympics. “You have made histo­ry,” he told them. The Olympics will be a much tougher mountain to scale even though Asian standards in sport like track and field, badmin­ton, table tennis, swimming and gymnastics are at a global level. Prior to the Asiad, nine Indian athletes had qualified for the Olympics and now, many others will join them. In earlier qualifica­tion competitions, Indian squads in disciplines like archery could not handle match pressure. Some of those athletes did not make it to Hang­zhou. The youngest Indian athlete was 13-year-old Greeshma in the artistic roller-skating event, and the oldest was 77-year-old bridge player Bharti Dey. While teenager Aditi Swami hit the headlines, so did roller-skater Sanjana Bathula and squash player Anahat Singh, both bronze medal winners at age 15. The new­ness is apparent in both the age profile of Indian participants as well as in the self-belief evident in athletes who do not see the highest honours to be beyond them. As the Games closed, the Indian women’s volleyball team shrugged off a 2-1 deficit against Hong Kong China to win the ninth spot at 3-2. They weren’t play­ing for medals but did not want to lose.

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