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Home , Deepika Kumari, Krishna Poonia, Mary Kom, Saina Nehwal, Sushil Kumar, Tintu Luka

A at the India has sent its largest ever contingent to the Games. But not every region is equally represented. Aabhas Sharma looks at how the Olympics states fare in their Olympic share

REUTERS

Wrestler is one of just two Olympic athletes from this year

THE SPORTY STATES NEITHER FOR THE RICH THE ZERO STATES URBAN-RURAL DIVIDE TOP CONTRIBUTORS NOR THE POOR Share of country’s population (percent) TOP CONTRIBUTORS 13 HIGH-INCOME STATES Bihar 8.58 Per capita 12 income (FY11) Athletes Gujarat 4.99 URBAN Delhi 1,16,86 2 2 Northeast 10 5.67 42 athletes Maharashtra 83,471 1 from cities Karnataka 9 Jammu & Kashmir 1.04 and towns Tamil Nadu 72,993 0 RURAL 5 Chhattisgarh 0.09 Gujarat 63,961 0 41 from 5 Himachal Pradesh 58,493 1 villages or Tw West Bengal 5 small towns m LOW-INCOME STATES a Per capita income (FY11) Athletes th It should not come as a surprise. Known Bihar 20,069 0 States constituting more than 20 per cent Numbers show that sports which call for “ for a strong sporting culture, Haryana takes 29,786 1 of India's population have no strong infrastructure, like , R the lead in the number of athletes it’s sent Orissa 36,293 1 representation at the Olympics. Take, for tennis, table tennis and shooting, attract to the Olympics — 13 out of the 83. Chhattisgarh 44,097 0 example, Madhya Pradesh and Tamil Nadu athletes only from big cities. Not one shooter b Expectedly, () and Uttarakhand 68,292 1 which have sent only one athlete each to or a badminton player in the contingent is e () are its forte. the Olympics. These states account for from rural areas. has become the T (though she grew up and almost 12 per cent of India's population. hub of badminton with players like Jwala a lives in Hyderabad) and drag flicker The numbers indicate that having a high What we see instead is that sports are Gutta and P Kashyap. From Bangalore come h Sandeep Singh also come from Haryana. per capita income is no guarantee that becoming region-centric, like boxing in and Rohan Bopanna. le Punjab comes a close second with 12 the state will produce great sportspersons. Haryana and shooting in the northern From rural areas, we see representation in a athletes. Known as the cradle of Indian Else Maharashtra and Gujarat would not region. Most athletes come , boxing and track-and-field a hockey, it has given eight players to the have scored so poorly in their from Kerala, Karnataka athletes. These are not sports which require in team. The North-east too scores high at representation at the Olympics. or Haryana. Even too much investment or high-tech h 10 with boxers like MC and and , in fact, also have an impressive badminton and tennis — infrastructure. Tintu Luka, the 800m runner z Devendro Singh to watch out for. infrastructure for sports. Delhi, which was sports played in urban is from a village in Kerala as is triple jumper n Karnataka follows at a close nine and then the venue for the 2010 Commonwealth areas — don’t seem to Renjith Maheshwary. Seema Antil and o come Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and West Games, also scores shockingly low with find too many takers in come from small towns in T Bengal with five players each. only two athletes at the Olympics. Poorer states like Maharashtra Haryana. Track and field events are clearly in states like Jharkhand and or Gujarat. Maharashtra being pursued by athletes from c Bihar also fare no better. which is home to about 9 small towns. d Clearly money and resources per cent of India's r don’t seem to make a population has sent only C difference. two athletes to the “ contingent. d h r

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