India Olympic Sports

"Where is the Indian team, Mommy?"

This was the question posed to me by my son who is fast approaching his 8th birthday. We are avidly watching the Olympics in Beijing and watched the opening ceremonies with eager anticipation of the United States team. The opening ceremonies of the Olympics have been great fun for us now that the children are old enough to ponder where in the world tiny countries like Eritrea and Andorra are. Admittedly we were channel surfing, having dinner, and otherwise not paying close attention, so we sort of missed the Indian delegation. We missed them, but I assured my son they were there. Just to double check, that night I googled Indian Olympic team and indeed there is a delegation of athletes in several sports.

We have been watching swimming, gymnastics, volleyball, and basketball, to name a few sports, but India is noticeably absent from these sports in which the US athletes excel. Traditionally, I explained, India has done very well in men's Olympic field hockey, but this year there is no team from India. The majority of the athletes are in track and field followed by riflery. The rest of the delegation are in boxing, judo, tennis, table tennis, and at least one person in sailing. Please accept my apologies for any sports I have missed.

It's a good question, really. It is a country that is known for superior academics producing scores of engineers, doctors, scientists, businessmen. It is a country rich with creativity and long cultural traditions in the arts, literature, architecture, music, dance, visual arts, to name a few. With it intellectual and natural resources, insanely large and culturally diverse population, one that values excellence in all of its forms, one begs the question: why are there not more Indian athletes on the center of the world stage?

I realize that many of the sports that are popular in the US and other western nations are in their infancy in India. However, let's discuss soccer, or football, as it is known in every other country on the planet. Soccer/football is a universally popular sport, played in virtually every populated country on the globe, with the notable exception of those who are busy at war, starving, or otherwise occupied. Nevertheless, the simplest of all games, kicking a ball and advancing it down a field around an opposing team to make a goal, is about as simplistic as a game can be. While India does not compete in the same circles as other soccer-crazed nations, there is a team that is deemed to be good enough to compete in the World Cup, so why is that team not at the Olympics?

Perhaps the issue is that the athletes are there, but they are not competitive on the world stage. At the winter Olympics in Torino, there were Indian skiers who apparently train in Russia. There is a possibility that someday we will see an Olympic figure skater from India. In 2007, Ami Parekh competed at the World Figure Skating Championships representing India, something that has never been done. Her story is somewhat typical of many skaters in the US who claim heritage from other countries. Train in the US, progress through the US competitive ranks, then skate for another country. It happens all the time and many skaters actually shop around for countries in need of representation in skating, regardless of their lineage. Not so with Ms.Parekh and her younger brother, Amar Mehta. Indeed, the way is paved now for figure skaters to compete for India. My hope is that this is happening in other sports.

For the record, Eritrea, is in Northern Africa, bordering the Red Sea on the east, Sudan to the north, and Ethiopia to the south. Andorra is an equally tiny nation wedged between Spain and France. As to the of whereabouts of Indian men's field hockey team, I can only assume that they have retired their sticks in favor of cricket bats, gearing up for the return of cricket to the 2012 games in London.