The Olympic Games have always been a global celebration of athleticism and every country enters with a different motive. Whether it be to secure the most medals, showcase their best athletes on a global scale, bring prominence to their country, or even to escape the tensions back home and allow the Games to be a temporary refreshing shade. Every country is different and all the athletes come from varied upbringing and development in their specific sport.
With that being said, many countries that didn’t perform as well as others received critical remarks targeted towards athletes, programs, and the country itself. Earlier today, British Journalist Piers Morgan tweeted,
“Country with 1.2 billion people wildly celebrates 2 losing medals. How embarrassing is that?”
His statement is obviously referring to India and its recent silver and bronze medals in badminton and wrestling respectively. The thing that Mr. Morgan doesn’t see is the backstory of how athletes in India come up to higher level play and how population of a country has little to no correlation with athletic performance.
Asides from the fact that more than a quarter of India’s population lives under the poverty line, one can’t expect the country to provide its athletes with the all the resources given by other developing nations like the United States for example. This isn’t a critical statement as there is always room for improvement in the future but it’s not right to compare nations that stand on different demographic transition stages. The sharp contrast between funding for athletic programs in India and the UK for example is irrational. A report in the Time Magazine states that India spends around $0.005 per head on sports each day against $0.30 for the USA. Also, an athletic career isn’t always the first choice for many due to the low rewards and uncertainty of the future in terms of career and funding. Outside of cricket, private investment for many sports is extremely low in comparison to other countries. Once again, this isn’t to say that India lacks altogether in athletic development but when comparing its condition to that of a developed nation, it’s not sensible to make comparisons on the amount of medals won at a global athletic conference.
With everything said above, India sent over a hundred talented athletes who really represented themselves and their nation to their best ability. Could they have done better? Of course, there is always room for improvement in terms of nurturing, rewarding, and grooming athletes. The fact that two athletes have won medals in events with oppositions from countries where resources for athleticism is abundant is worthy of appraisal. Two athletes who have gone through the athletic nurturing system in India and have represented their nation at the topmost level is such an honor itself.
So Mr. Morgan, why not let India celebrate? Why not appreciate the journey the athletes have gone through to qualify and win with the resources they have been given? Why take away the celebration from a nation that is showing evident signs of development on a global scale and instead of encouraging further participation of Indian athletes at future games, why shut down their celebratory reactions to the achievements of their athletes?
Citations:
http://www.ndtv.com/india-news/virender-sehwag-epic-response-to-piers-morgans-tweet-on-indias-olympic-celebration-1449911
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