NO SURPRISE
In fact, this is not a surprise. Whereas China has systematically strived for Olympic success since it re-entered global athletic competition after years of isolation, India has remained complacent about its lack of sporting prowess.
China lobbied for and won the right to host the Summer Olympics barely two decades after its return to the Games. But India rested on its laurels after hosting the 1982 Asian Games in Delhi and is now seen as being further behind in the competition to host the Olympics than it was four decades ago.
In the run-up to the 2008 Beijing Games, China embarked on Project 119, a government programme devised specifically to boost the country’s Olympic medal haul (the 119 refers to the number of golds awarded at the 2000 Sydney Games in such medal-laden sports as track and field, swimming, rowing, sailing, and canoeing and kayaking).
Indians, by contrast, wonder if they will ever crack the magic ceiling of ten medals.
China, seeing the number of medals on offer in kayaking, decided to create a team that would master a sport hitherto unknown in the Middle Kingdom.
But India has not even lobbied successfully for the inclusion in the Games of the few sports it does play well, such as kabaddi (a form of tag-team wrestling), polo or cricket, which was played in the 1900 Olympics and never since.
Likewise, China has developed new strengths in other non-traditional sports, like shooting, while maintaining its dominance in table tennis and badminton.
India, by contrast, has seen its once-legendary invincibility in field hockey fade with the introduction of artificial turf, to the point where a bronze for the men’s team in Tokyo prompted great exhilaration.
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