First Day First Medal
Mirabai opened India’s medal account on the very first day of the Tokyo Olympics with a Silver medal, That was such a euphoric moment ! Unforgettable. And thanks to technology we could watch history being made as it unfolded.
Mirabai from Manipur…. the land of Krishna. Such a beautiful apt name. Immediately someone made this artwork and AMUL made an amazing poster as always.
There are several young sportspeople who are representing India at the Olympics in sports that have hardly any following in India. For instance Fencing and Bhavani Devi winning her match against the world no.4 was a first. Krishnan and I have met the Swedish fencing champ Sophie Haarlem in 2011 in Botswana and realised how big this sport was ! It has been a part of the Olympic Games since 1896. Its only in 2021 that we have Bhavani Devi representing India in fencing. Its huge.
In Sailing, we have Nethra Kumanam, the first woman to represent India in sailing at the Olympics. And she does that in a borrowed boat as her boat got damaged during transport. Whether she wins a medal or not, just the fact that she qualified for the Olympics will inspire a whole generation ❤️.
I am not speaking of P V Sindhu or Deepika Kumari or Mary Kom only because they have represented India in the Rio Olympics. Their achievements are equally spectacular and inspirational.
Manika Batra and Sutirtha Mukherjee gave us some Table Tennis highs… And well Sharath Kamal losing to the greatest TT player Ma Long was in a way a victory !
Personally, after Bhavani Devi I have become a fan of Lovlina Borgohain. This young lady is the first woman boxer from Assam to qualify for the Olympics. There is a swag to this young lady and my intuition says she will create history and win several medals throughout her career.
India @ Tokyo Olympics Today
Atanu Das was trailing as we switched on the TV in the morning today. We kept watching the game and I started praying when it was a draw and just one arrow was to decide the winner. Atanu Das won !!
Then all the good news started pouring in – Sindhu entered the quarterfinals; The Indian Hockey team beat Argentina to enter the quarterfinals; Satish Kumar entered the quarter finals of Men’s super heavy weight boxing !
Mary Kom lost her bout but she is a winner already… So a great day for India at the Olympics today.
I wish we win lots of medals and we see India leading the medals tally some day. There is no dearth of talent but we have never had a government that focussed on Sports and created the infrastructure required for it. Things are changing and am sure, the dream of seeing the Tricolour on top of the medals tally will also happen soon. I don’t subscribe to the famous statement “sports is about participation” – I want India to win in every sport !!!
Best wishes to all our sports stars representing our country at the Olympics – their efforts and achievements in the face of tremendous challenges is inspirational.
Jai Hind.