Paris 2024 | After Budapest, how ready are Indian athletes for next year’s Olympics?

With Neeraj Chopra's gold at the Budapest World Athletics Championships, India's javelin throwers and horizontal jumpers have been inspired to strive for success. Indian athletes have the potential to win at Paris Olympics 2024. India must continue to improve its training and build mental toughness for its athletes.

Nine-year-old Thathagat Kumar and his father Ajay Kumar had the most surreal time of their lives last Sunday when javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra, the historic World Athletics Championships gold medal around his neck, made his way to a group of Indian fans in the stands at the National Athletics Centre in Budapest and clicked a selfie for them.

For the Indians in the stadium, watching track and field athletes from their country on the final night of the prestigious competition was the icing on the cake. For eight days, the few hundred Indians had contented themselves with being world citizens, cheering Americans, Jamaicans, Ethiopians, Kenyans and Canadians, among others.

Then, as Budapest transformed from an unbearably hot and humid host in the first half of the championships to a cooler clime when the curtains came down, India’s fortunes changed. It was seen in better light by not just the 36,000 fans of different nationalities at the stadium, but also many beyond.

In 90 minutes punctuated by the heartening efforts of fellow javelin throwers Kishore Jena and D.P. Manu, Parul Chaudhary’s national record in the 3,000m steeplechase final, and the men’s 4x400m relay team’s heroic run on the second successive night, Chopra’s gold medal, a first for India in half a century of World Championships history, became the highlight of the week.

“It was surreal,” says Ajay, a Mumbai-based edutech entrepreneur. “I wanted to give Thathagat, who follows a range of sports, the experience of watching multiple disciplines in one event. He got to watch a legend like Jamaican sprinter Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce from close quarters. She has defied age, come back to the track after motherhood, and been a great ambassador.”

Yet, the truth is that apart from a small community of hardcore fans, Indian athletics does not attract much attention at home. It will be a while before a larger group of fans travels to major athletics competitions around the world to cheer on their country’s talents. The sport needs heroes and many of India’s aces are but works in progress.

With the young in the audience having been weaned on various screens that bring home legends from a variety of sports, India’s athletes have a massive challenge on their hands. Until they are seen more often — and seen winning — cult status as obtained by cricketers, for instance, will be hard to achieve.