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India's Olympic star Neeraj Chopra promised to bring Prime Minister Narendra D Modi some homemade churma after a successful return from the Paris Olympics during a video conference with Olympic-bound athletes and the PM on Thursday, July 4, 2024.
After returning from the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, Chopra had promised Modi some homemade churma (a popular Harayanvi sweet) but the athlete was unable to do so and Modi reminded the javelin thrower of it.
'I will bring churma for you this time. Last time in Delhi, I got churma made in sugar but this time I will bring churma made with desi ghee and gur (jaggery) from Haryana,' Chopra told Modi.
To this, Modi replied: 'Mujhe aapke maa ke haath ka khaaana hai (I'd like to have churma made by your mother).'
Neeraj replied with a 'Pucca, sir'.
During the interaction, Chopra shared his fitness concerns while advising younger Paris-bound fellow athletes to be fearless.
Chopra has been troubled by an adductor niggle for the past couple of months.
'We are now training in Germany and it is going very well. This time I am playing in less competitions because on and off I am suffering from an injury. But now it is a lot better, a few days back I played a competition in Finland and that was pretty good,' Chopra told Modi, referring to his top finish at the Paavo Nurmi Games last month.
'We have one month before the Olympics and I am trying to reach Paris completely fit and give 100 per cent for my country,' he added.
'Olympics comes in four years and I would like to tell every athlete that you get this chance once in four years and we must try to find out what is that thing which can push us to give our best.
'Tokyo was my first Olympics and in tghe first Olympics, the result was pretty good, I won gold for the country. There was no fear in my mind, and I had self belief because I had good training,' he said.
'I would tell every athlete not to fear anyone or anything. We don't have to fear Europeans or Americans because they are also human beings like us.
'If we can recognise ourselves, we have been living outside our homes for long time and training hard, so nothing is impossible.'