Eight years ago, one Olympic evening, something scarcely believable was playing out in front of our eyes. Dipa Karmakar was in the medals bracket after the initial rounds of the women’s vault competition. She didn’t get one eventually, and finished fourth. But that effort catapulted her into the list of India’s all-time great efforts in the history of the quadrennial celebration of sports.
Fourth place in the Olympics was no longer memorable for Indians in 2016. In 2012 in London, they had secured six medals and three of them four years prior to that in Beijing. Dipa was not performing in the age of Milkha Singh or PT Usha, who had finished fourth many years before her and became immortals in the history of Indian sport. Even Abhinav Bindra had finished fourth in the same edition in Rio de Janeiro. Few remember that.
Dipa’s vault still remains one of the most miraculous Olympic adventures by an Indian for a few reasons. First, gymnastics was never and still not is an Indian endeavour. The country was doing well in shooting, wrestling, boxing and badminton. Hockey had been a legacy sport. Gymnastics was unheard of from an Indian perspective. Even at the Asian level, success was negligible. From there to coming so close to podium at the Olympic Games was a quantum leap. It was a work of art which defied logic and science.
Second, Dipa comes from Tripura. Part of the ‘Seven Sisters’, or the states which constitute the country’s north-east region known for its fervour for sports, Tripura is the most backward in terms of sporting excellence. Even today, it has not produced another sportsperson worth a mention at the national level. It’s among the backward of all Indian states as far as pursuits of sports are concerned.
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Tripura has just about basic infrastructure for the only game it plays at the national level, which is cricket. From there, shining at the top level in a discipline like gymnastics is as unbelievable a story as India’s sports followers will ever come across. Only one word describes Dipa’s journey — impossible. Yet, she came within fractions of touching the medal every sportsperson in the globe craves for. Just to believe that she could do it was a monumental effort, if not bigger.
Third, Dipa tried and nearly perfected possibly the most dangerous trick in a sport which demands surreal levels of physical flexibility. Named after Russian gymnast Yelena Produnova, the vault called ‘Produnova’ is also known as the ‘vault of death’. That’s because even the most minute of errors in execution can paralyse a gymnast for life. It’s either perfect or fatal, with nothing in between. Encouraged by her coach Bishweshwar Nandi, who is also from Tripura, Dipa had the courage to perform that. And she nearly pulled it off at the biggest of competitions.
As India glosses over the Olympic achievements of 2008 onwards and celebrates the athletes who secured medals including gold, like Bindra and Neeraj Chopra, one better not forget what Dipa did. Not all incidents of sporting excellence are justified with medals. Some path-breaking efforts can end in something which cannot be quantified. In the annals of Indian sport, Dipa’s was one such effort. In the discipline of gymnastics, there was nothing close to it before or after it.
At the age of 30 now, she overcame doping controversies and became the first Indian to bag a medal at the Asian championship earlier this year. It was not enough to secure a ticket for Paris 2024. But then, isn’t she one of India’s most incredible Olympic performers already?
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