India in Tokyo Olympics

Yet, another Olympics is completed and as expected India did poorly compared to its size. India won only 7 medals(1 Gold, 2 Silver and 4 Bronze). Even with this poor performance, there is something that is good to see. The medal tally of India has been increasing from the first Olympics I remember(Sydney 2000). I remember whole country celebrated when Telugu girl Karanam Melleswari won bronze medal in weightlifting. She is bombarded with so many gifts from across the country, which she fully deserved. In 20 years the number went up by 7 times. Which is note worthy. Simultaneously, the number of athletes selected to participate in Olympics also increased from 65 to 124. 

Below is the medal tally of India from 2000 Olympics. (I got this information by quick google search)

Olympics	Number of Athletes	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
Sydney 2000	65	0	0	1	1
Athens 2004	73	0	1	0	1
Beijing 2008	56	1	0	2	3
London 2012	83	0	2	4	6
Rio 2016	117	0	1	1	2
Tokyo 2020	124	1	2	4	7

Looking further from numbers, even athletes who didn't win any medal have made giant leaps. Be it Rani Rampal's women hockey team, Golf sensation Aditi and many others. The amount of coverage Olympics got in India is heart warming. The way people enjoyed sports other then Cricket is super awesome. The disappointment people(like me) got when these awesome players missed medal shows the interest these sports person ignited. The whole hearted appreciation these sports person received even after failing to win medal shows that these games have bright future.

For me, these Olympics thought some new terms. So far I didn't know that there are core Olympic sports which are in general called "Track and Field". Sports like Running, Disk throw, Javelin throw form this group. The credit for me knowing this goes to Neeraj Chopra, first gold medal winner in a "Track and Field" sport from India. 

Be it Neeraj Chopra, be it PV Sindhu, be it Meerabhai Chanu, be it Ravi Kumar Dahia, be it Bhajrang Punia, be it Lovlina Borgohain, be it Men's hockey team, be it any other participant from India. You all made us happy.