The "India's Greatest Sportsperson" Debate

India celebrated its National Sports Day yesterday, a day when the country pauses to remember one of her greatest sons – Major Dhyan Chand, often called a wizard or a magician and indisputably India’s first ever sporting superstar.

In fact, in my personal opinion, he should have been the recipient of the Bharat Ratna in 2014 when the Government of India finally made changes that paved way for the eligibility of sportspersons. Awarding Sachin before Dhyan Chand was an unfortunate and probably a populist decision.

Did Sachin deserve a Bharat Ratna? Most certainly he did! There is no denying his greatness, contribution or eligibility for India’s highest civilian honour. But Dhyan Chand, often considered globally as being at par with the likes of Bradman, Laver, Ali or Pele – athletes who not only ruled their respective sport but pretty much reset the limits of what’s humanly achievable, perhaps deserved it earlier.

Unfortunately though, that wrong hasn’t been righted yet. In the 6 years since Sachin became a Ratna, no other sportsperson has been deemed fit for the honour!

However, the BharatRatna-for-DhyanChand debate is not what I set out to write about today. So, let’s get right down to business.

My first memory of watching sport is when I, barely six years of age, sat alongside my father and witnessed a 17-year old Michael Chang win the 1989 French Open and thus become the youngest man ever to win a Grand Slam. And since then I’ve watched sport practically every day of my life. Different disciplines. Live broadcasts and replays. And not just world championships and Olympics but even state, district and school level competitions.

And I’ve often wondered if I can, one day, come up with a list of India’s greatest ever sporting heroes. I have heard and read enough debates about the merits (of the lack thereof) of pitting the greats of one sport against another. Or about comparing sporting achievements from one era with those of another. And yet, today I sit here, with the unwavering resolve of a Kohli hunting down a 300-plus target, to pen down a few lines about the top 5 remarkable Indian sporting heroes that I have had the blessing to see in action.

The aspects I have considered while coming up with this list are simple.

1. The last 3 decades I am only considering greats whom I have seen in action. As much as I have read about the history of Indian sports and about our sporting greats, I still do not feel comfortable commenting on heroes whom I have not seen in action. For example, if there ever was a Leander Paes vs. Ramanathan Krishnan debate, Leander will almost always get my vote because he is the one I have followed closely since I was a kid. And I am not denying Krishnan Senior’s greatness in any way, I most certainly have immense respect for his Wimbledon semifinal exploits and for all that he has done for Indian tennis. Therefore, this article has been penned considering sporting achievements since 1990.
   

2. Global success Success at the world level has to be and is a defining criteria for greatness in any discipline.
   

3. The Inspiration Quotient Every once in a while, there comes around an athlete who not only attains success on the field of play, but also becomes a role model and an inspiration to an entire generation of budding athletes. Take for example, a young Kapil Dev striving to bowl fast in a nation of spin wizards and dry flat pitches. Did it inspire an entire generation of young kids to pick up the red cherry and try bowling quick? You bet it did! Another case in point is the incredible Saina Nehwal. The Olympic bronze aside, I feel her bigger achievement has been revitalizing the badminton scene in India. With the emergence of “Saina vs. China”, the parents who had solemnly vowed to make their children aim for the north star named Sachin, suddenly had another star to aim for!
   

4. Cricket is religion, not sport! And finally, no cricketers in this list, much to your chagrin I am guessing! But there are two very clear reasons for this decision, and I didn’t even need the DRS to review it! Over the last several years Cricket has been the one sport we’ve really been good at globally (albeit a rather small globe comprising merely 10 or so countries!). And so, we have way too many cricketing superheroes in this country. Including them all here could then lead to some other true non-cricketing greats missing out. Also, if you ask me who, in my opinion, is the greatest Indian cricketer I will probably give you three different names! Sachin, for sure, for his records, his longevity and for the way he shouldered the expectations of an entire nation throughout his career. But also, Dravid in Tests and Kohli in ODIs, since I strongly believe that these two gentlemen have won us more games than anyone else in these respective formats! Hence, to keep things simple, cricketers miss out on the honour of being named in my personal list of sporting greats!

Alright, now that the “no-cricket” disclaimer and the criteria have been laid out, let’s get down to the names.

At number Five: Leander Paes

When the 1996 Atlanta games got underway, India had last won an Olympic medal in 1980 and an individual Olympic medal in 1952! All that changed when a young man from Kolkata turned it around, beating higher ranked players like Nicolas Ferreira and Thomas Enqvist on the way! In fact, some people, including yours truly, like to believe that had he faced two-time French Open champion Bruguera in the semis, instead of Agassi, he could well have won himself at least a silver.

But it is not just the one medal that defines Leander’s legacy. In the 1990s, India would feature regularly in the Davis Cup World Group, thanks largely to Leander winning three rubbers in three days, more often than not against much higher ranked players. Every time he played for the country, Leander pulled off a surprise, be it against Ivanisevic on the grass courts of Delhi or Arnaud Boestsch on the clays of France!

At number Four: Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore & Mary Kom

Ok, I know this is cheating! I said I’ll name five, but there is simply no way I can leave some of these legends out of this list.

Today India is considered a significant force in the world of shooting. Medals by the dozen at the Asian level and in ISSF World Cups, as well as a few in the Olympics, bear testimony to India’s rise as a shooting powerhouse. And it was all sparked by Rathore’s nerves-of-steel showing at the 2004 Games to win India’s first ever individual Olympic Silver! He, along with Abhinav Bindra, inspired an entire generation of young people to look at shooting as a viable career option. The growth of Indian shooting and the recent emergence of prodigies like Manu Bhaker, Saurabh Chaudhary and Apurvi Chandela were made possible when Rathore’s shots were fired at the Athens games.

And what does one write about the magnificent Mary Kom! A lady who has never hesitated to challenge prevailing notions. A lady who has picked up an incredible eight world championship medals including six golds (two of which came after she became a mother!) to go with an Olympic bronze, in a seemingly masculine sport like boxing! The only reason she doesn’t have more Olympic medals is because women’s boxing was not an Olympic sport till 2012. And like a true legend, Mary is using her money and her fame to develop the next generation, having built her own boxing academy in Imphal! The Nikhat Zareens and the Lovlina Borgohains sure have a truly inspiring role model to look up to.

At number Three: Viswanathan Anand & PV Sindhu

In the 1990s, following chess was difficult. There was no internet and cable TV was in its nascent days. To add to that, chess is neither as visually appealing as some other disciplines nor exactly a common man’s sport. But whatever little coverage it received in the print media was all because of one man: Anand. Some call him “The Lightning Kid” because of his speed of making moves, while some say that he, along with the great Bobby Fischer, is one of the top two non-Soviet players in the second half of the last century. And yet, if there is one stat that defines Anand’s legacy for me it is this: In 1988 India got her first grandmaster in the form of the ever-smiling boy from Chennai, today we have 66 GMs! And to say that Anand was not one of the reasons, but the “only” reason for most of these new generation GMs to take to the sport is, by no means, an exaggeration. And as I write this, India has just beaten Poland to reach the finals of the first ever online Chess Olympiad. The chess revolution in India is well and truly on!

While Saina inspired a whole generation to take badminton seriously and won India’s first ever Olympic medal in the sport, the much younger Sindhu has been the more consistent success story globally. The current world champion has a whopping 5 world championship medals to her credit, to go with the silver that she won at the London 2020 Games. And incredibly she is still only 25, which implies that a few more medals may well be on the cards! She already is the most decorated Indian shuttler ever, and it is no surprise then that she is the youngest member in this hallowed list of greats.

At number Two: Sushil Kumar

In a country woefully short of Olympic glory, this man alone has two medals! In an individual sport, one that has traditionally been dominated by the Soviet nations and America and more recently by Iran and the East European countries. And Sushil has changed the paradigm for wrestling in India in more ways than one. On the one hand his global successes have changed the mindset of young wrestlers in the country and their aspirations. And on the other hand, Sushil has single-handedly managed to change how the one-dimensional and largely one-sport Indian media traditionally covered wrestling. Wrestling updates now feature proudly and regularly in the sports pages of national dailies and are no longer confined to just the local Haryana press.

And at number One: Abhinav Bindra

Well, was there ever any doubt about this? This man did, in 2008, what no Indian ever has. An individual Olympic Gold Medal! In a country like ours, that is almost as rare as a congenial and harmonious Arnab Goswami debate!

And he almost scripted a fairy tale ending in the 2016 Games when he missed another medal by a whisker, losing the bronze medal shoot-out with his career’s last ever shot.

But Bindra’s legacy is and will be much more than just the one medal. It will remain historic, but there will hopefully come a day when India could become a sporting superpower, and an abundance of medals would probably render his gold a little less luminous.

But he, along with Rajyavardhan Rathore, inspired a generation of youngsters to look at shooting as a potent career path. He changed the mindset of Indian shooters and made them eager to strive for international glory in their own rights! And that should be Bindra’s lasting legacy.

A few honourable mentions: Anju Bobby George, Bhaichung Bhutia, Vijender Singh, Pankaj Advani, Saina Nehwal & K Malleswari

All incredibly successful and infinitely inspiring athletes and true legends in their own rights! And they are no less deserving of a place in the India’s greatest sporting hero conversation. I could not place them in my personal top 5 but seeing them in someone else’s list of greats will not surprise me one bit!

Before I end, I just wanted to reiterate that this list is based entirely on my personal likes, dislikes, judgements and knowledge of sport as I have watched in the last thirty years. Disagreements are welcome and I’d love to see your comments in the comments section below to see what you feel or what your list of greats would look like!

And with that, it’s time now for the full-time whistle!