Indian athletes returned home from Guangzhou in China with a bag of 64 medals, including 14 gold. Though some of them failed to perform at their best, they look forward to Olympics in London in 2012 and Asian Games in Incheon, Korea in 2014.
India’s medal hunger began with billiards ace Pankaj Advani, who repeated his Doha gold medal-winning feat. However, one can’t expect gold in London Olympics as this sport doesn’t feature in it. The country’s other athletes shone in many disciplines beginning from Athletics, Tennis, Boxing to Wrestling.
The Indian athletes won medals in 400m hurdles (both men's and women), 10,000m run and 4X400m relay. Beaming over her protégé Tintu Luka’s win in the 800m run, the erstwhile sprint queen P T Usha said that she was happy that the country produced its best performance at the Asian Games. She said that she was not unhappy with Luka not winning gold because she was young and there were opportunities ahead. Usha said that Luka failed to give herself a last fillip in the last 100m as she suffered hamstring problem.
After the gold medal in billiards, hopes of medals in athletics rose after Railway employee from Kerala, Preeja Sreedharan and Nashik girl Kavita Raut came first and second in the 10,000 metres followed by Sudha Singh who secured the 3000 metres steeplechase gold. The steeplechase medal was the first by an Indian and China's Bai Xue was stunned by Preeja and Kavita’s run.
Tennis player Somdev Devvarman and shooter Ronjan Sodhi scripted memorable wins. Others who achieved stardom with their performances include Lal Takhar (rowing gold), Sanam Singh (men's tennis doubles gold), Vikas Krishan (men's boxing gold), Preeja Sreedharan (women's 10,000m & 4x400m relay golds), Ashwini Akkunji (women's 400m hurdles & 4x400m relay golds), Joseph Abraham (men's 400m hurdles gold) and Sudha Singh (women's 3000m steeplechase gold).
Sania Mirza who bagged two medals each at the Asian Games and Commonwealth Games said she was happy with her return to form. She said that many had written her off but the back-to-back wins had boosted her confidence. Sania, who won a bronze in singles and silver in mixed doubles with Vishnu Vardhan, is hoping that the New Year would boost her career.
Setting a target of winning gold at the London Olympics, men's 400m hurdles champ Joseph Abraham said that he could not afford to be over-confident now but focus on the Olympics. Comparing the performance at Beijing Olympics, women's 4x400m winner Manjeet Kaur said that they ended seventh in the relay and would aim to do better in 2012.
India’s men hockey is also not shinning after it lost to Malaysia in the semi-final and had to settle for Bronze. In the earlier pool matches, they had defeated Pakistan and South Korea. The gold eventually went to Pakistan. The shooters too failed to fire except Ronjon Singh Sodhi who secured gold in the double trap. Gagan Narang could only bag two silver medals. Boxers Vijender Singh and Vikas Krishan bagged gold while the others added three silver and four bronze to the kitty.
Riding high on the success of Beijing, and now Guangzhou, World No 1 pugilist Vijender Singh wants to win Gold in London. The other medal hopes are likely to be Abhinav Bindra, Gagan Narang, Ronjan Sodhi, Manavjit Singh Sandhu, Tejaswini Sawant, boxers Vijender Singh, Suranjoy Singh, wrestlers Yogeshwar Dutt, Sushil Kumar and tennis ace Somdev Devvarman.
At the two outings in China, at the Beijing Olympics, India won just one gold (Abhinav Bindra in shooting), and two bronze medals (Vijender Singh in boxing and Sushil Kumar in wrestling), while at Guangzhou, they won 14 gold, 17 silver and 33 bronze. In India, even before the money is spent on a right way, there are allegations of overspending, the need and so on. In other countries, such issues are not raised and the whole country immerses in producing talented and medal winning athletes.
Take the case of China, where Beijing spent USD18.3 billion on new stadiums, roads and subway lines for conducting the Asian Games in Guangzhou, in contrast UK has earmarked only USD 14.7 billion for the London Olympics. At Guangzhou, China had won 416 medals that included 199 gold, 119 silver and 98 bronze, while in 1990, it had won 183 gold. However, India’ performance has dipped instead of rising. Since the Games began in Delhi in 1951, the Indians have crossed the 50-medal mark only three times. Once in 1982, securing 57 medals, in 2006 at Doha they won 53, while this year at Guangzhou they won 64. However, India's best gold haul of 15 came in 1951.
It is sad that the athletes after winning medals abroad return home to a cold welcome, unlike cricketers who are given a royal treatment. After waiting for several hours to head home, the gold medal winning women's kabbadi team, gold medalist in the women's 400m hurdles Ashwini Akunji and relay champion Manjeet Kaur finally made their own arrangements. The Indian Olympic Association (IOA) gave them a rousing reception but forgot to give them a cab ride. Only if the government or a popular cricketer could come forward will the change happen and many would take to other sports and bring home more such laurels.