Why 2023 was a landmark year for Indian athletes

From Neeraj Chopra to the strong showing at the Asian and Para Asian Games, Indian athletes inspired and empowered 

- Deepti Patwardhan

The year 2023 was one of reckoning for Indian sport. While Indian sport stars continued to soar to greater heights on the field, the battles behind the scenes often spilled over.

The year started with some of India’s top wrestlers, including Olympic medallists Sakshi Malik and Bajrang Punia and Olympian Vinesh Phogat, taking to the street to protest against then Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) chief Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh. The wrestlers found little support in the power corridors of Indian sport despite Singh, a Bharatiya Janata Party member of Parliament, being accused of sexually harassing several wrestlers, including a minor. Though Singh was dismissed as the WFI president, one of his aides, Sanjay Singh, was elected to the post on 21 December. Within a week, the Union sports ministry also suspended the newly formed WFI for hastily announcing U-15 and U-20 national trials in Gonda, Uttar Pradesh—Brij Bhushan’s stronghold—by the end of the year.

The year ended with Malik, India’s only woman wrestler to win an Olympic medal, quitting the sport in tears hours after Sanjay Singh’s election. She deemed it a battle lost. The episode threw light on the systemic struggles Indians, especially women, have to face, no matter how many medals or laurels they have won.

The silver lining? In possibly the longest and most public protest launched by Indian athletes, it proved that some of them were not afraid of taking on a much bigger enemy and championing causes beyond the sports field. Even if it came at a hefty price in their careers.

Though the wrestlers’ protest has left an indelible mark on Indian sports history, as the year draws to a close, we look back at the happier, affirming times. When Indians excelled in a more objective, black and white world of sports. When they inspired and empowered.