'Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among the stars!' This sums up India's campaign at the Paris Olympics 2024. But is it a success or a failure? The country with the highest population is proud, happy, content, and satisfied with the performance of India's 'star' athletes, who ended up at the 71st position in the Paris 2024 medal tally, with no gold, 1 silver, and 5 bronze medals—totalling 6 medals.

From rejoicing the 4th position-finish of athletes in many events to appreciating players for merely qualifying for the Games is making the country, which is at the 126th position out of 143 nations in the World Happiness Report, happy! the United Nations (UN) should take note of it and hope to see India jump a few places in next year's Happiness Index! Well, or maybe that's the reason why India is among the least happy nations. Irony? Yes, we settle for less and that is the reason why we are unhappy. The methodology to select the happy nation is to get an answer from citizens after thinking of a ladder, with the best possible life for them being a 10 and the worst being a zero. They are then asked to rate their own current lives on a scale of 0 to 10.

Similarly, here at the Olympics, if a gold medal is a 10, Indians are satisfied and happy with a bronze, a 4th-position finish, or just a qualification. We are satisfied with only the starting points of the ladder. This makes our efforts to climb the ladder less efficient and effective; we need hunger to go up the ladder. Being content and in a comfort zone, Indian sportspersons cannot aim to go high and achieve the ultimate goal, whether it be gold or breaking records.

Why is India, the nation with the highest population, ranked 71st in the 2024 Paris Olympics Games Medal table?

Lack of talent? No.

Lack of facilities? No.

Arshad Nadeem, from a developing country like Pakistan, winning a gold medal proves that you just need sheer talent and everything else will fall into place. Even if you look at the journeys of all the medal winners from India at the Olympics, they come from humble backgrounds, started their careers in Tier-2 cities, and rose to the top. They deserve what they have achieved. India has improved a lot in terms of facilities and infrastructure for training athletes. As pointed out by Indian badminton team mentor Prakash Padukone, “All the support and finances needed to perform at the top level were given to the Indian players. It’s not like earlier times when our players lacked facilities and funds. So, it’s high time our players step up and win as expected.”

But the point we are missing is that there is no dearth of talent and facilities in India. Apart from these determined athletes, we have far more and many talented kids who may not know what superpower or talent they possess.

In this interview, the points raised by Indian star footballer Sunil Chhetri are spot on when he says India is full of talent, but not scouting them at the right time is the problem.

Sunil Chhetri Speaking on Sporting Talent in India and Scouting Them at the Right Time:

How many of us have held a javelin, tennis racquet or hockey stick, or seen a Pommel Horse on a Gymnastics floor when we were in primary school?

The answer to the above question explains why India is settling for the 71st place on the medal tally at the Summer Olympic Games in Paris 2024. Who knows, one of us who is reading this is/was a potential medal winner but never tried our hand in the respective sport and is unaware of the talent we possess. 

The first thing Indian parents do when their kids turn two is to start looking for a kindergarten or a school, not a stadium or a club where the child could train as a future Olympian or a sportsperson. Indians strongly believe, 'Padhoge Likhoge Banoge Nawab, Kheloge Kudoge Honge Kharab', which roughly translates to: 'If you study, you will become successful; if you play, you will become unsuccessful in life'.

'Padhoge Likhoge Banoge Nawab, Kheloge Kudoge Hoge Kharab' Song From 'M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story'

The only way to increase the number of Neeraj Chopras and Manu Bhakers among Indians is to understand that sports is necessary for kids' growth. Sports make us good human beings; sports in all forms teach us how to celebrate success together, regroup and fight failure together, and respect our opponent. Encouraging kids to take up sports at an early age and treat sports as important life lessons may change our perspective. If we need to shoot for the Moon, shoot with the billion arrows we have. The best ones will most likely land on the Moon, and the others will always remain the stars in our eyes.

(The opinions expressed in the above article are of the author and do not reflect the stand or position of LatestLY.)

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Aug 12, 2024 04:53 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).