I have two points to say about the Commonwealth Games performance of India. First, look at the countries that participated:
| § Anguilla § Bahamas § Barbados § Belize § Bermuda § Botswana § Brunei § Cameroon § Canada § Cyprus § Dominica § England | § Gambia § Ghana § Grenada § Guernsey § Guyana § India § Jamaica § Jersey § Kenya § Kiribati § Lesotho § Malawi § Malaysia § Maldives § Malta | § Namibia § Nauru § Nigeria § Niue § Pakistan § Rwanda § Saint Vincent and the Grenadines § Samoa | § Scotland § Tanzania § Tonga § Tuvalu § Uganda § Vanuatu § Wales § Zambia |
Those marked in pink above are countries whose existence most of the Indians have not known of at all. Those marked in green above are countries that everybody knows that are not at all big names in sports at all, barring one or two events here and there. Only those countries marked in RED ( 5 countries) are probably good in sports, especially Australia.
Now, look at the 2008 olympic medal tally at Beijing:
2008 Medal Tally
| Medal Tally | ||||
| Country | ||||
| China | 51 | 21 | 28 | |
| United States | 36 | 38 | 36 | |
| Russia | 23 | 21 | 28 | |
| Great Britain | 19 | 13 | 15 | |
| Germany | 16 | 10 | 15 | |
| Australia | 14 | 15 | 17 | |
| South Korea | 13 | 10 | 8 | |
| Japan | 9 | 6 | 10 | |
| Italy | 8 | 10 | 10 | |
| France | 7 | 16 | 17 | |
| Ukraine | 7 | 5 | 15 | |
| Netherlands | 7 | 5 | 4 | |
| Jamaica | 6 | 3 | 2 | |
| Spain | 5 | 10 | 3 | |
| Kenya | 5 | 5 | 4 | |
| Belarus | 4 | 5 | 10 | |
| Romania | 4 | 1 | 3 | |
| Ethiopia | 4 | 1 | 2 | |
| Canada | 3 | 9 | 6 | |
| Poland | 3 | 6 | 1 | |
| Hungary | 3 | 5 | 2 | |
| Norway | 3 | 5 | 2 | |
| Brazil | 3 | 4 | 8 | |
| Czech Republic | 3 | 3 | 0 | |
| Slovakia | 3 | 2 | 1 | |
| New Zealand | 3 | 1 | 5 | |
| Georgia | 3 | 0 | 3 | |
| Cuba | 2 | 11 | 11 | |
| Kazakhstan | 2 | 4 | 7 | |
| Denmark | 2 | 2 | 3 | |
| Mongolia | 2 | 2 | 0 | |
| Thailand | 2 | 2 | 0 | |
Out of the nearly top medal winning 32 countries of Olympics 2008, those that participated in our Commonwealth Games at Delhi are just 5. Australia, England, New Zealand, Jamaica and kenya. In effect, we have competed against maybe just 5 to 6 "world class” sports Nations while all other Nations are not really such qualitatively good sporting nations. Take Kiribati, Lesothu, Tonga, vanuatu not to mention Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Falkland Islands, St.Kitts islands etc. And, good quality sportspersons of Great Britain pulled out of the Games at Delhi citing some reasons. England were not at their full strength. New Zealand, Jamaica and Kenya are traditionally good only in a few events and they have managed to retain their premier positions in those events. In effect then, we probably had only one quality Nation to compete against and we ended up second.
Second point: India ended up with 37 or 39 gold medals. Did you notice that we got 33 of them in Shooting, wrestling and weightlifting? 3 disciplines only. And 4 medals i think in badminton!!! Well, i dont think it is so creditable, after all, is it? Finishing second in an effective contest with 5 countries that were all not in full strength and that too winning 90% of the medals in 3 disciplines chiefly, well, well, though it may be harsh to say so, somehow, i dont think we performed great what with a truncated field and wins confined to/restricted to 2-3 disciplines.
The only creditable performance was maybe our Women relay team and discus throw wins. Both these are also below par performances when compared to the world records in the events. The world record for discus throw is 76.8 mts. for women while our CWG gold medal throw by our Indian woman was 61.15, with more than 15 metres difference, which is way way below the best performance because the second longest distance is 74.15 and third also above 70 mts.
Which is why, though we did our best, i dont think India deserves any serious mention unless, in this nation of mediocrity, we deem it a great achievement, albeit not in the true sense of the term. It may be an achievement for us, but not really so when seen against true facts.
Well, what do you say?
