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India in Olympic Games Tokyo 2021

With seven medals – one gold, two silver, four bronze – Tokyo 2020 has been the most decorated Olympic Games in India’s history. Here’s the story of the seven stars who scripted the success. Neeraj Chopra didn’t compete on the international stage for 17 months, between January 2020 and June 2021. Saikhom Mirabai Chanu went without competition from December 2019 to April 2021. PV Sindhu featured in five tournaments from March 2020 till the start of the Olympic Games. During the same period, Lovlina Borgohain used the money she received as part of her Arjuna Award – the second-highest state honour for Indian sportspersons – for the treatment of her mother’s kidney ailment. While Ravi Kumar Dahiya grappled on the mats in Tokyo, the local administration in his village in Haryana had to make special arrangements to ensure his parents could tune into the action without any electricity cuts. Bajrang Punia had to forfeit a match a month ago after injuring his right knee, which would remain strapped through most of his contests in Tokyo. The Indian men’s hockey team had spent most of the last one and a half years locked down at a national training facility in Bengaluru. In the six months leading up to the Tokyo Games, they had spent a total of four days at their respective homes. In the best of times, it takes the struggle of a lifetime to deliver the holy grail of an Olympic medal. As India reeled under the disastrous first and second waves of the COVID-19 pandemic, it was the worst of times to exist – leave alone train for sporting glory. And yet, the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 conclude as the most successful in India’s 120-year history of competition. These seven champions have travelled far and wide to make that happen. This is their story, recapped.

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