Target Tokyo

Still A Month Shy Of Turning 21, Indian Athletics’ Poster Boy Neeraj Chopra Is Setting His Sights On A Medal On The Biggest Stage Of Them All: The 2020 Olympics In Tokyo.

- Tanmoy Mookherjee

WITH about an hour to go for her scheduled bout, wrestler Vinesh Phogat had decided to pop over to the Carrara Stadium with high jumper Tejaswin Shankar, to see compatriot Neeraj Chopra demolish the field in the men’s javelin final with a (then) season’s best of 86.47m to claim India’s first ever gold medal in the throwing event in Commonwealth Games history. India had finished a respectable third in the overall medal standings, aided by a new wave of Indian athletes who have been brandishing their camaraderie all over social media. The landscape of sports in India has undergone a paradigm shift in recent years, with interest in sports other than cricket rising thanks to a ‘boom’ in franchise-based “leagues,” but more so due to the rise of sportspersons from various disciplines.

Chopra is one such athlete, who in the two years since setting a Junior World Record has become the poster boy of Indian athletics, and whose on-field achievements leading to sponsorship deals with corporate giants is ensuring more talents like him coming from India’s hinterlands don’t go unnoticed. There’s a certain nonchalance in people from Haryana, most noticeably amongst athletes coming from the northern region of India. Take, for instance, Virender Sehwag, the former cricketer who minces no words in his often-hilarious tweets. Then there is Sushil Kumar, the only multiple individual Olympic medal winner from India, who can have an audience in splits while narrating stories from his youth. At a press conference after winning one of his first gold medals at a senior event, Neeraj Chopra also oozed similar confidence, and much like his illustrious peers, a raw simplicity in articulating his answers.