A look at India’s Olympic medal wins, Paris to Tokyo. Wrestlers account for one
Kolkata-born Englishman Norman Pritchard is regarded as the country’s first Olympic medallist, winning two silvers when he competed for India in 1900.
ThePrint looks at all the medals India has won at the Olympics, from a decades-long winning streak in hockey to the best tally yet at Tokyo in 2021.
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Paris, 1900: Silver medals on the track
Competing in the 200m hurdles at the 1900 Paris Olympics — the second Games after the ancient event was revived in 1896 — Pritchard set an Olympic record of 26.8 seconds in the semifinals, and bettered his time in the final to 26 seconds. However, it was the silver medal that Pritchard took home, as the US’s Alvin Kraenzlein had set another new record — 25.4 seconds — to clinch the gold.
Pritchard would go on to win a second silver medal in the same Games, this time in the men’s 200m sprint
Men’s hockey winning spree
Amsterdam, 1928 — Gold: The Indian hockey team won its first Olympic gold medal in Amsterdam. The win was credited to hockey wizard Dhyan Chand, who scored 29 goals in five matches.
Los Angeles, 1932 — Gold: At the 1932 Olympics, in a match with a reduced field, Roop Singh, Dhyan Chand’s younger brother, scored 10 goals, while Dhyan Chand himself scored eight to lead India to a second consecutive gold medal.
Berlin, 1936 — Gold: Leading India to an 8-1 victory over Germany in the finals, Dhyan Chand helped the team secure its third consecutive gold medal. The match also saw Dhyan Chand scoring his second hat trick in an Olympic final.
London, 1948 — Gold: The hockey team clinched the first gold medal for India after Independence. Balbir Singh Senior, who contributed 19 goals in three games on the way to the title, helped India thrash the UK 4-0.
Helsinki, 1952: Gold in men’s hockey, bronze in wrestling
In Helsinki, Balbir Singh Senior made history by scoring five goals against the Netherlands in an Olympic men’s hockey final, playing in the cold and under the midnight sun, and securing India’s fifth Olympic gold medal in a row.
Wrestler Khashaba Dadasaheb Jadhav clinched India’s first individual Olympic medal the same year with his bronze in the men’s freestyle bantamweight category. Known as the Pocket Dynamo, he had mastered a technique called dhak, where a wrestler throws his opponent to the ground with a headlock.
Melbourne, 1956 — Gold: Registering its sixth consecutive Olympic gold, India defeated Pakistan 1-0 in the tournament final. Captain Balbir Singh Senior played despite suffering a fracture to his right hand during the game. In his memoir, Singh wrote that his “biggest achievement was playing for an independent India. It was a great honour to bring pride to a sovereign country.”
Rome, 1960 — Silver: India’s unmatched gold medal record in…
Read More: A look at India’s Olympic medal wins, Paris to Tokyo. Wrestlers account for one 2023-06-04 07:00:00