India’s underperformance in the Olympics highlights lack of sports culture, poor infrastructure and corruption. This article offers a roadmap for reform to reclaim country’s Olympic glory.

With a population of 1.5 billion people, India is a nation filled with potential, but when it comes to the world’s biggest sporting stage, the Olympics, India has had a very poor record. Even with our vast numbers, we still face problems in recognizing and nurturing the sports talent that is buried within our nation. It raises the question: really, is it that difficult to develop champions in a country the size of ours, or does the problem go much deeper in the politics that has enmeshed our sports administration? Walking away with six medals, none of them gold, from global competitions is more than disappointing—it’s reflective of deeper systemic issues that need urgent attention. Shall we laugh at the absurdity of this situation, or mourn the lost potential? It is high time we disentangle politics from sports and give our athletes the help they need.
Comparative Analysis: India vs the World
To grasp the extent of India’s underachievement at the Olympics, a comparison with countries with smaller populations but far better Olympic records is essential.
Take Hungary and New Zealand, for example—nations with populations of approximately 10 million and 5 million, respectively, yet which frequently surpass India on the Olympic stage. Hungary, despite its tiny size, has won over 500 Olympic medals, including more than 175 golds. Despite having an even smaller population, New Zealand has won over 140 medals, including more than 50 golds. In sharp contrast, India, which has a population 140 times that of New Zealand, has won just more than 35 medals in its Olympic history, with only 10 gold.
This difference, therefore, brings out the key point that mere population does not equal Olympic success. Several other countries, with far less populations, have been able to create strong sporting systems that offer talent opportunities and produce world-class athletes, whereas India has apparently failed to do this, in its sea of humanity.
Causes of India’s Olympic Underperformance
1. No Sports Culture: In India, sports, more so at the grassroots level, take a backseat to academics. The culture that has been inculcated in society revolves around education being the means to success. Talented athletes are oft pressurized into giving up their sporting dreams for “secure” and “stable” career options.
2. Lack of Infrastructure: The infrastructure in the sphere of sports is really deficient in India. Many budding athletes are devoid of good facilities for training, the equipment needed, and appropriate coaching. Such training facilities as are there in meagre measure are largely located in metropolitan cities, which means that the talents from rural areas remain untapped. Following are some of the glaring examples of mismanagement within the Indian sports system: An Indian player reached the final of her sport at the Olympics by knocking out an unbeaten opponent in the semi-final. However, she was ruled out from the finale because her weight was 100 grams more than the permissible limit.
This incident portrays not only the lack of good support systems but also the lack of attention to detail in Indian sports management. In professional sports, such a thin margin should have been managed by the coaching staff and support system. If everything had gone amiss, the athlete should have been under close watch and corrected long before the weigh-in. This inability ended in disaster, not only for the player but indeed for the whole country.
3. Bad Governance and Corruption: Inefficiency and corruption are the two main problems afflicting the administration of sports in India. Mismanagement of funds, lack of transparency, and red tape always make it impossible for permissible resources to reach the needy players.
4. Shortage of Financial Assistance: Compared to a nation that invests money in its sportspeople, India provides little financial assistance in sports. Most sportspeople lack financial stability which robs them of their training capability to capability. To meet their training requirements, many top sportspeople depend on personal or private funding.
5. Poor Talent Identification and Nurturing: There is certainly no system in India to discover and groom talent from a very young age. China and the USA have already established academies and scouting programs to find and groom young talent, but India has no structured program.
6. Disproportionate Focus on Cricket: One of the critical factors relating to the poor performance of India at the Olympics has to do with this disproportionate investment in the game of cricket when compared to other sports. Indeed, cricket is a craze in India, and the country invests much in promoting cricket. The Board of Control for Cricket in India is one of the wealthiest sports bodies not only in India but across the globe; the infrastructure, training facilities, and financial succour given to cricketers are unparalleled to any other sports in the country.
But the priority given to cricket is at most a huge cost to other sports. Essentially, the Olympic sports of athletics, gymnastics, and wrestling all receive only a fraction of the monetary support that cricket can lay claim to. This difference can be clearly evidenced through the facilities, coaching, and general opportunities that are provided or otherwise made available to, say, athletes in these specific disciplines.
Lack of investment in other sports makes talented athletes go to waste, thereby lacking the opportunity to support themselves at such levels of competition. Targeting cricket thereby skewed public interest and media coverage in a manner that has created difficulty for any other sport to gain an appropriate level of sponsorship and the strong support it could have built.
The Way Forward: Preparation for Future Olympics
Every stride and every great leap in India’s journey toward being an Olympic powerhouse involves drastic reforms at every level. Here are a few steps that can work in aiding a better performance by India in future Olympics:
1. Inculcation of Sports Culture: This is a key way of ensuring that a sporting culture is built into the psyche of the country. Schools and local clubs must inculcate ways in which children take up sports, and create awareness among parents about careers and opportunities for their children related to sports.
2. Infrastructure Investment: The government should team up with the private sector in pitching up world-class sports facilities across the country, especially in rural areas, where indeed India’s untapped talent lies. Proper training facilities and access to them are two critical ingredients that must be considered as the platform centring on the creation of a top-notch level of athletes.
3. Reform the Process of Sports Admin: The entire system has to undergo transformation. A completely independent sports body operating through transparent and answerable systems can bring down cases of corruption, at the same time ensuring that the resources are spent correctly.
4. Financial Security for Athletes: They should avail of financial incentives, scholarships, and sponsorships to guarantee that they can always train without any question of their financial well-being. A pension system for retired athletes can be established to further encourage young talent to take up sports with seriousness.
5. Scientific Talent Identification and Development: India needs an organized system of identifying and grooming young talent. This must include regional sports academies, international coaches, and a well-organized mechanism to scout for raw talent in various Olympic disciplines.
6. Diversify the Focus Beyond Cricket: After all, cricket is a pride for the country, but one has to divert surplus attention and share resources to develop sports like the Olympics with enhanced media coverage, corporate sponsorships, and government backing.
Encouraging the Private Sector: The private sector could significantly contribute to the development of sports in India by investments in training facilities and through sponsorship of athletes, leagues, and tournaments. Public-private partnerships can bring in funds and expertise that could help increase the eligibility of infrastructure and coaching standards.
8. Learning from Successful Nations: India can learn from the sports models of countries that have consistently performed well in the Olympics. In this regard, best practices like China’s state-sponsored training programs, among others, can ideally be emulated to build a more effective sports system for India.
Underperformance in the Olympics is an offshoot of deep systemic problems that India needs to tend to at the earliest. By overcoming these challenges and enacting some of the recommended changes, take into consideration the fact that India may find herself in a much better place come the next Olympics. With that magnitude of population and given that it remains mostly untapped, India does have the wherewithal to bloom as an Olympic powerhouse, but only if very fundamental shifts are to be realized in the country’s sport. Olympic acclaim may not be easy to conquer, but with proper strategies and commitment, India can surely regain the lost pride in sports and bring back gold medals that people so ardently wish to win.
The writer is the Founder, Director, CEO of Rooh e Hayat Centre
[email protected]

Mujahid Azimabadi