Olympics: The India Story

by Boria Majumdar, Nalin Mehta

'A pioneering and long-awaited book ... a delightful read' -Hindustan Times 'The first detailed history of India's Olympic experience ... a valuable addition to contemporary knowledge'-India Today When and how did the Olympic movement take root in India? Who were the early players and why did they appropriate Olympic sport to further their political ambitions? In most accounts of Olympic history across the world, India's Olympic journey is a mere footnote. The India Story sets that  right. Drawing on previously unused archival sources, it demonstrates that India was an important strategic outpost in the Olympic family. It explores why the Indian elite became obsessed with the Olympic ideal at the turn of the twentieth century and how this relates to India's quest for a meaningful role on the international stage. First published to critical acclaim in 2008, this revised edition includes a new, incisive chapter on India's medal prospects at the London Olympics, thus bringing India's Olympic story up-to-date.

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 16, 2013

About the author

Boria Majumdar, a Rhodes scholar, is a Research Fellow at La Trobe University, Melbourne. He has taught at the Universities of Chicago and Toronto and has written extensively on the history and politics of cricket in India and across the world. Deputy Executive Academic Editor of the International Journal of History of Sport and Executive Academic Editor of Sport in Society, he is General Editor of the Routledge Series, 'Sport in the Global Society'. Some of his books include Twenty-Two Yards to Freedom: A Social History of Indian Cricket (2004), Goalless: The Story of a Unique Footballing Nation (2006) and The Illustrated History of Indian Cricket (2006).

Reviews

[Sandhya Chandramohan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book has been a pleasure to read and very enlightening at that. I have often wondered what it is that's wrong with our sports system. Why can a country of a billion hardly win a medal at the Olympics? Usually I dismiss the thought with one word. Cricket. And maybe another word. Politics.
But it is only after reading this book, that I now understand how deep and intricate is the spider's web that we are caught in. Power politics, colonialism, nationalism, regionalism, infighting, media, popular culture, what not!? Ultimately it is the poor athlete who sacrifices many a comfort, toils day in and day out and sheds many a tear for his moment of glory that suffers. This is a story that delves deep into that godforsaken system, how it came into being, how it fed into divisive energies, of how the the Indian sportsperson got wronged and how we failed as a sporting nation.