India basks in rare success at Manchester games
N. Ananthanarayanan
Indian athletes, often slammed for their failure to win medals in major international events, are basking in glory after their rare success at the Commonwealth Games in Manchester.
India have scooped 22 gold medals in a total haul of 57 with two days of competition still remaining and are lying fourth in the medals' table behind Australia, England and Canada.
From a modest seventh place finish in Kuala Lumpur in 1998 with just 25 medals, seven of them gold, they might now even overhaul Canada in the final standings as both teams have 22 golds.
While the shooters and weightlifters with 11 golds each were the main hopes, other sports have also played a part.
Rifle shooter Anjali Vedpathak Bhagwat has become the toast of India at the age of 34 with four gold medals so far.
Bhagwat, who became the first Indian woman to enter an Olympic shooting final in Sydney, leads a crop of shooters who are beginning to show the benefits of regularly competing abroad.
The introduction of women's weightlifting has helped India, where diminutive Nameirakpam Kunjarani Devi swept all three golds in the women's 48-kg class and Sanamacha Chanu did likewise at 53 kg.
Indian lifters have also enjoyed success because of the Commonwealth Games federation's decision not to alter its rule of giving separate medals in the snatch and clean and jerk sections.
In other sports Anju Bobby George cashed in on India's decision to field an athletics squad after 16 years by becoming the country's first woman to win an athletics medal with a long jump bronze.
And fighters Md Ali Qamar and Som Bahadur Pun are also in line to bag India's first boxing gold, as both have reached the finals.
Indian Olympic Association (IOA) president Suresh Kalmadi hailed the performances and said he hoped they would boost the athletes and trainers ahead of this year's Asian Games in South Korea.
"We have been good in every department of the Games," Kalmadi told Reuters.
"It will also give credibility to our bid to host the 2010 Commonwealth Games," he said. The venue will be chosen next year.
The success has helped Indian sports authorities justify their decision to send a 148-member squad to the Games. They usually struggle to convince the government, which pays the airfare, to send their athletes who are seen by fans as enjoying undeserving trips abroad at the tax payers' expense.
India managed a lone bronze medal at the 2000 Sydney Olympics through woman weightlifter Karnam Malleswari while tennis player Leander Paes came third in the men's singles at the 1996 Atlanta games in 1996 in the only podium finish.
Images: Day 9
