A lengthy roster of medal contenders could make the London Games India’s best Olympic showing yet
Twenty years ago, when I went to my first Olympic Games, we newbies were tutored to look first for the Olympic Hockey schedule and then plan what else we would see and report on. We certainly had not been taught to look for India in the medals tally; aside from hockey, India had only ever won three other medals. Even our last hockey win, in 1980, had come after a longish gap, and at Games depleted by a boycott.
We worked then on rickety portable typewriters—computers and mobile phones were distant dreams—and skimpy budgets. But we loved every moment of it. Our days began with a walk up Montjuic Park to the Olympic Stadium (built during the 1929 depression but not used till the Games).
Montjuic is a hill overlooking Barcelona’s harbour and this is where the famous Font Magica (Magic Fountain) is located right under the Palau Nacional, the National Museum of Catalonia. At that time, the Catalans were fighting for independence and the police were ever on guard for any trouble.
But for us, Spain had this air of romance and we were happy soaking it up. We would sit at roadside cafés, swill beer, sip wine and watch senoritas till dawn broke. We filed mini-reports of boxers being eliminated in the first round, of iconic archer Limba Ram reaching the second round, of the hockey team losing or drawing and occasionally beating a lowly-placed team.
Our moment of immense pride came when a young Leander Paes and the gentlemanly Ramesh Krishnan got to the tennis men’s doubles semis. The entire Indian contingent was there to cheer them, but they lost to Goran Ivanisevic and Goran Prpic of Croatia. The Croatians would go on to win their country’s first medal (Ivanisevic won a singles bronze as well).
For India, tennis seemed to be a good bet for a medal. Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi, who had stopped playing the pro circuit together, were still coming together to play for India. In 1996 and 2000 they had lost in the second round, both times to the famous Woodies (the Australian pairing of Todd Woodbridge and Mark Woodforde). Woodforde had retired in 2000, so fingers were crossed for the Indian Express. In the second round they played Swiss legend-in-the-making Roger Federer and Yves Allegro—and won, finally getting beyond their second round jinx. But they lost their semis, and came tantalisingly close in the bronze medal match before losing 14-16 in a marathon third and final set.
Proving Their Metal
Who are India’s medal prospects? V Krishnaswamy, veteran sports journalist, sticks his neck out to make some predictions.
(This story appears in the 20 July, 2012 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)