Indian Sport 2021 | Neeraj and Sindhu epitomised India’s remarkable surge

Kohli & Co’s series win Down Under will rank among the greatest feats; Paralympic athletes added sheen to the nation’s accomplishments

To think of India’s Olympic history in track and field is to think of two heartbreaks. At the 1960 Rome Olympics, the late Milkha Singh — who passed away this June — fell short of a podium finish in 400m by one tenth of a second. Twenty-four years later, P.T. Usha lost out in the 400m hurdles by one hundredth of a second.

This was until Neeraj Chopra, a beefy 23-year-old from Haryana, hurled a javelin over 87.58m to secure India’s first-ever Olympic track and field gold and only the second individual gold after Abhinav Bindra (Beijing 2008).