Greatest victories in Indian sporting history so far in 77 years of Independence

Today, August 15, 2023, we Indians celebrate 76 years of our country’s independence from the British throne. On this day, India attained freedom in 1947 and has since grown into a global powerhouse. Despite being an independent country for 76 years, India’s sporting heritage goes back to the early 1900s. Since then, sports have become a crucial element of India’s global identity. Our country has produced icons finding paramount success and unprecedented feats across various sports. Hence on India’s 77th Independence Day, SportsTiger brings to some of India’s most significant sporting victories in history. 1. Mohan Bagan’s win over East Yorkshire Regiment in 1911 Mohan Bagan, one of India’s oldest football clubs, created history after defeating the British Army’s Eastern Yorkshire Regiment. This victory propelled the Mariners’ to win their maiden Indian Football Association Shield title. Talking about the match, an India 11 of bare-footed individuals, coached by Sailen Bas, went 1-0 down after Sergeant Jackson scored for the East Yorkshire Regiment. But thanks to goals from skipper Shibdas Bhaduri and Abhilash Ghosh, Mohun Bagan pulled off an unsurmountable comeback. #PAGE_BREAK# 2. Indian hockey team completes Olympic gold medal hattrick in 1936 Led by India’s greatest hockey star, Dhyan Chand, the Indian national team won its third consecutive Olympic gold medal. After winning the 1928 and 1932 field hockey events, the Indian team were favourites, especially with their undefeated 48th-win. But the 1936 Berlin Olympics started with a loss in the opening warm-up game. However, as the official tournament started, India stormed through their group while scoring 20 goals and conceding none. This dominant run continued with a 10-0 win over France in the semis and an 8-1 victory over Germany in the final. #PAGE_BREAK# 3. Khashaba Jadhav wins India’s first individual Olympic medal in 1952 India dominated the Olympics with its hockey teams but the country was still awaiting an individual medal at the global sports event, which was finally won by Maharashtrian wrestler Khashaba Jadhav in the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki. After finishing sixth in the previous Olympic event, Jadhav started strong in Finland by defeating Canadian Adrien Poliquin and Leonardo Basurto of Mexico. But two consecutive losses against Rashid Mammadbeyov and gold medallist Shohachi Ishii led to Jadhav winning a bronze, thus earning India's first ever medal at the Olympics. #PAGE_BREAK# 4. Indian football team wins gold in Asian Games 1962 The Indian football team haven’t had many international titles but one of the Blue Tigers’ greatest triumphs came in the 1962 Asian Games, where Goa-born Neville D’Souza-led team clinched the gold. In the group stage, they lost once before winning two consecutive games to enter the knockouts and beat South Vietnam 3-2. The final against South Korea saw PK Banerjee and Jarnail Singh score for the Blue Tigers to help India win the gold. #PAGE_BREAK# 5. India’s first Test series win in England in 1971 After finding no results in the first three Test matches of the four-game series, the Ajit Wadekar-led Team India beat England on the final Day of the 4th Test clinching the team’s first series win on English soil. This victory marked a new era in Indian cricket as Wadekar’s men had previously won a series against the formidable West Indies. Talking about the 4th Test, England scored 355 runs and India responded with 284. The second English innings saw Bhagwath Chandrashekar pick up 6/33 to set India a 173-run target which was chased with four wickets to spare. #PAGE_BREAK# 6. India win the 1975 Hockey World Cup Before hockey’s downfall, the Indian men’s national team won their first and only World Cup title in 1975. The Indian team just lost one match in the tournament against Argentina. But India took down European powerhouse Germany 3-2 and knocked out hosts Malaysia 3-2 in extra time to book a final with Pakistan. In the summit clash against Pakistan, the son of hockey wizard Dhyan Chand and Ashok Kumar scored the winning goals and help register a historic 2-1 victory. #PAGE_BREAK# 7. Prakash Padukone wins the All England Open 1980 Starting as India’s teenage prodigy, Prakash Padukone took home badminton’s most prestigious title the All-England Open in 1980. Ahead of this tournament, Padukone was the reigning Commonwealth champion and had also won the Danish and Swedish Opens. Facing the Indonesian Liem Swie King in the final, Padukone started with a 10-0 lead and bagged the first game 15-3. It was a similar story in the second game with Padukone clinching the title with a 15-10 win. #PAGE_BREAK# 8. India wins 1983 Cricket World Cup Considered one of the best underdog stories in the sporting world, the Kapil Dev-led Indian team defeated the mighty West Indies in the final to win its first World Cup in 1983. After shocking wins over the West Indies and Zimbabwe in the opening games, India had a string of losses against Australia and West Indies and desperately needed to beat Zimbabwe. Here, Dev scored his historic 175 and helped India reach the semi-final against England. After defeating the hosts, India took the West Indies in a low-scoring final where Mohinder Amarnath emerged as the Player of the Match. #PAGE_BREAK# 9. P. T. Usha’s victory at Asian Games 1986 After a marvellous Asiad debut, PT Usha came to her second Asian Games after winning gold in all her events at the 1985 Asian Athletics Championships. The gold rush continued at the Asian Games 1986 in Seoul as the Payyoli Express recorded the highest individual medal tally in track and field, claiming four golds and a silver. Despite the hectic schedule, which saw PT compete in three races in less than two hours but she gave it her all in every heat to triumph. #PAGE_BREAK# 10. Leander Paes wins bronze medal at Olympics 1996 Over India’s sporting history, the country has produced a limited few tennis stars. Among these stars has been Leander Paes, who fulfilled a childhood dream of levelling with his father, Dr Vece Paes, by winning an Olympic medal. Paes was joined on the podium by American great Andre Agassi and Sergei Bruguera from Spain. Paes entered the Atlanta Olympics as a wildcard and dominated until his semifinal clash against Agassi, where he perished. But in the bronze medal match, the Indian took down Brazil’s Fernando Meligeni to win 3-6, 6-2, 6-4. #PAGE_BREAK# 11. Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi’s historic 1999 After Leander Paes’s Olympic medal, he and Mahesh Bhupathi had a dream 1999 calendar year as they reached the men’s doubles finals of all four Grand Slams and won the French Open and Wimbledon. The duo also rose to World No. 1 in the men’s doubles tennis rankings, in addition to an ATP Tour title in Chennai. At Roland Garros, the Indian duo beat Goran Ivanisevic and Jeff Tarango 6-2, 7-5 in the final and became the first all-Indian pair to win a Grand Slam championship. Then at the All-England club, the Indian Express, beat Paul Haarhuis and Jared Palmer 6-7, 6-3, 6-4, 7-6 to win the Wimbledon. #PAGE_BREAK# 12. Viswanathan Anand wins World Chess Championship in 2000 India’s first Grandmaster, Viswanathan Anand, created history as he won his and the country’s first World Chess Championship in 2000. After a strong run in the competition in Tehran, Anand reached his maiden final and faced off against No.1 seed Alexei Shirov of Spain. Viswanathan Anand finally overcame his defeats in 1995 and 1997 to win the World Chess Championship by a margin of 3.5 to 0.5. Since then, Anand has won the championship twice - in 2010 and 2012, by beating Vaselin Topalov and Boris Gelfand in Sofia and Moscow. #PAGE_BREAK# 13. Karnam Malleswari wins bronze at Olympics 2000 48 years after India’s first individual, Karnam Malleswari became the first Indian woman to win a medal at the Olympics, which came in 2000 in Sydney. The Srikakulam-born athlete competed in the weightlifting disciple and attempted 110kg and 130kg in the 'snatch' and 'clean and jerk' categories, to a total of 240kg. Competing against Hungary’s Erzsebet Markus and China’s Lin Weining, Malleswari became the first Indian woman to win a prestigious Olympic bronze medal. #PAGE_BREAK# 14. India wins first Kabaddi World Cup in 2004 One of India’s favourite sports, Kabaddi has presented the country with countless victorious moments. But to start India’s glorious run, the national men’s team won Kabaddi’s first World Cup in 2004. The Indian team went undefeated throughout the tournament, starting in Pool A with Canada, Thailand and the West Indies. Then in the knockouts, the Men in Blue took Bangladesh 39-19 in the semi-final stage before defeating Iran 55-27 in the final. #PAGE_BREAK# 15. Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore wins silver at Olympics 2004 Retired Indian Army officer, Sports Minister and a Member of Parliament, Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore shot to stardom as he became India’s only medallist at the 2004 Olympics in Athens. Rathore, competing in the Men's Double Trap shooting event, won the silver medal. He started the day with 46 in the first round. Then round 2 with windy conditions saw Rathore finish with 43 and 46 in the third round. In the finale, Rathore finished second behind UAE’s Shaikh Ahmed Almaktoum to clinch the Silver. #PAGE_BREAK# 16. India wins T20 World Cup in 2007 After a historically poor ODI World Cup campaign, a new era was ushered into Indian cricket as a young Indian team led by MS Dhoni won the inaugural T20 World Cup in South Africa. The Men in Blue lost just one game and dominated the world beaters like South Africa, England and Australia to reach the final. In the summit clash, India defeated arch-rivals Pakistan with a last-over catch to win the country’s first ICC title after a long drought. #PAGE_BREAK# 17. Abhinav Bindra wins gold medal at Olympics 2008 In a true red-letter day for Indian sports, Abhinav Bindra won India’s first individual gold medal at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, China. Bindra clinched the gold in the 10-meter air rifle event shooting a total of 700.5. Talking about the moment Abhinav Bindra won the historic medal, the 40-year-old had a near-perfect 10.8 on his last shot. #PAGE_BREAK# 18. India wins ODI World Cup in 2011 Building on India’s 2007 T20 World Cup win, the Men in Blue won the ODI World Cup after 28 years and emerged as the first team to win the tournament as a host nation. The Indian team had a near-perfect run with just one loss to clinch the trophy. Slaying demons from the past World Cups, India took down two-time defending World Champions Australia in the quarter-final before taking down arch-rival Pakistan in the semis. Then in the grand finale, MS Dhoni and Gautam Gambhir carried India to a historic chase and helped the team lift the World Cup. #PAGE_BREAK# 19. Indian hockey team wins gold at Asian Games 2014 After decades of poor performance, the Indian hockey team went on to win the gold in the 2014 Asian Games in Incheon, South Korea. Before this gold medal, India failed qualification for the Beijing 2008 Olympics but won silver at the 2010 Commonwealth Games. The Men in Blue also reached the 2012 London Games but finished last. Hence this gold was crucial for Indian Hockey’s resurgence. In the gold medal, India took down arch-rivals Pakistan 4-2 with a splendid performance by SV Sunil. #PAGE_BREAK# 20. PV Sindhu wins second Olympic medal at Rio 2016 In India’s topsy-turvy 2016 Rio Olympics campaign, badminton ace P.V. Sindhu fell short of a historic gold medal against Carolina Marin of Spain; but created history by becoming the first Indian woman to win two Olympic medals. Sindhu took down stars like Hungary's Laura Sarosi, Canadian Michelle Li, Chinese Taipei’s Tai Tzu-Ying and Nozomi Okuhara of Japan before reaching the final. However, Sindhu fell short in a marathon gold medal match as Marin took the win 19-21, 21-12, 21-15. #PAGE_BREAK# 21. Neeraj Chopra wins gold at Olympics 2020 14 years after Abhinav Bindra’s gold, Neeraj Chopra created history to win India’s first gold medal in an athletics event. Chopra won the men’s javelin throw event and took some world's best javelin throwers like Anderson Peters of Grenada and Keshorn Walcott from Trinidad and Tobago. In the final, Chopra started with 87.03m in his first attempt and improved it to 87.58m in his second. Despite a few poor attempts, Chopra’s 87.58m won him the historic gold. #PAGE_BREAK# 22. India wins Thomas Cup 2022 India’s men’s badminton team won its maiden Thomas Cup title with a stunning 3-0 win over 14-time winners Indonesia in the final. India had a performance for the ages with ac shuttlers Lakshya Sen, Kidambi Srikanth and then the world number 8 doubles duo of Chirag Shetty and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy producing memorable performances.