An Indian athlete has never won a medal in the winter Olympics, which have been primarily dominated by countries like Germany, Canada, Russia (and/or the Soviet Union), the United States, and Norway.

For the summer Olympics…

In the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics, Kumar, Bindra, and Kumar won bronze, gold, and bronze medals for boxing, shooting, and freestyle wrestling, respectively.

In the Athens 2004, India’s Rathore earned a silver medal in shooting.

Malleswari won a bronze medal in women’s weight lifting in the Sydney 2000 Olymipics.

The few athletes produced by India, when compared to its vast population, clearly demonstrates some limiting factor must be holding back India’s potential. Until a greater emphasis is placed on athletics, more athletic facilities are built, and more money is funneled into sports, India will continue to be out-shined despite its enormous potential. Its athletes stand little chance when put up against athletes from western countries where athletics are encouraged from an early age and sports facilities are readily available.

The low output of Indian Olympic athletes has been a trend over the years. In the Summer Olympic Games, in Athens in 2004, India sent 73 athletes, in 2008 in Bejing, they sent 59. In comparison, America sent delegations of 619 and 594 respectively. When it comes to Winter Olympics, it gets even more dispersed. In 2006 in Turin, India sent 4 athletes, and recently sent 3 to Vancouver, while America sent 211 and 216.

Many of the powerhouse sports nations spend hundreds of millions of dollars training and preparing their athletes for competition. This can be due to the social and economic history and development of each nation too. India, as Lindsay mentioned, is a very young nation and as India keeps growing economically, they will have the resources to spend on athletics. This is a great goal to aspire to, but won’t come to fruition for a while; it will take time for India to build up its athletic resources. It should be interesting to see how these athletes perform against the best in the world, and hopefully they can win some medals!

This is a great article, Danielle. It is interesting that Indian Olympic-hopeful athletes often work for the railroad or for the police or military. Might as well pay the bills with a job where you get to flex some muscles instead of sitting in a cubicle or customer service call center!

I think Jason Silver, our budding sports manager, might like to visit GoSports (http://www.gosports.in) while we are in Bangalore! As we see more emphasis on athletes in India, it is likely that sports managers and endorsements in India become more common. The article mentioned Limca, the soda company, and their sponsorship of athletes. As we learned last week, they were acquired by Coca-Cola; I wonder if we will see more US-owned companies that have a presence in India providing sponsorships to Indian athletes…

The Indian Olympic Association has stated that Delhi will bid for the 2020 Olympic Games. I think that a home Olympic event will drastically change the presence of Indian athletes. With reduced travel costs, many athletes will likely take advantage of the opportunity to train and prepare for the local games. The pride in earning the bid to host would likely lead to an increased drive to earn medals in 2020.

I agree with you that the Olympics are a missed opportunity for India, but my feelings is that this is going to change. We have to remember that India is only 60 years old - a very young country. Moreover, it was not until recently that some of the people even have the resources to train for an Olympic event. When living in poverty, you have much more important things on your mind than practice.

However, I think this will change. There is a celebrity culture in India (Bollywood) and an Olympic athlete celebrity culture could absolutely emerge. It would take some medals and some dynamic personalities, but India seems primed to grow in this area. A couple success stories is all it takes to get the youth interested in Olympic sport - and then a whole new generation of Olympic athletes can take shape.