The "Olympicgasm" Ends Today. Then, What?

The 2020 Tokyo Olympics (thank you COVID for this eternal quiz question - When was the 2020 Olympics held?) ends today, and India finishes 48th, ranked based on some sorting algorithm that prefers Gold medal over overall medal tally (surely some South-Indian was on that decision meeting. Yahh, Racist Alert!). This was the largest contingent ever sent to the Olympics by India and has also been its most successful. The first Indian athletics Gold Medal, the resurgence of Indian Hockey, and the marvellous performances apart, it also showcased the potency that we have been underplaying for ages, that our sportsperson can reach out and challenge the best in the world. 7 medals in total doesn’t speak volumes when we boast of one of the worst per capita medal counts, however that “capita” did raise its capitum this time around.

This edition of the Olympics noticed the largest viewership in India. Each event that Indians participated was covered. The wins were cheered, the losses were sympathised with, statuses had their frenzy game along with posts and tweets and reels and stories and what not. WhatsApp forwards in groups had a daily match schedule in it. Mornings began with an update of the leader boards. We watched the 50km walk, the heats of the races, and yes, a solo Indian horse and its companion (don’t say master) making India proud. And cumulatively as a nation we gasped, choked on our tears, drank in our emotions, cherished the moments, and were elated at every feat achieved – irrespective of a victory or a loss, irrespective of podium or farewell – for us they were the winners. When Neeraj Chopra took that last throw, that Javelin was headed straight for glory, of Olympics, of Indian sports fraternity, of Indian audiences glued to the scores, and a biopic, maybe. “The journey not the arrival matters”, TS Eliot had written – but is it, really?

If you are reading this on the 8th of August 2021, then the Olympic ends today, and with it a fairy-tale ends too. What happens from 9th? What changes? We get back again to see whether India wins on the 5thday or not, or get on our work. That’s it.

“Citius, Altius, Fortius – Communiter” reads the revised Olympic motto. “Communiter” was added to exemplify “the togetherness” that we should have for the sports – but in a greater truer sense, do we? How far are we from forgetting all this – a Kohli century away? A Bumrah fiver away? A Premiere League Puskas goal nominee away? – How far are we?

I, You, We can name the all the players who have played for Indian Men’s Cricket Team since the 2000s, name each position that Messi has ever played, and some more and something else. But can we name all the players of our hockey teams? Do we know who all even participated in athletics? Did we know any others before they won us a medal? Yes, won us a medal – while they were fighting against obscurity and obstacles to beat humans trained in world-class institutions or similar scenarios – we basked in their medals. There is no malafide intent in basking in their glory, forgetting them like a beach tan surely is a maleficent act.

These performers will withstand the scourge of time, their medals will, their victories will and even their defeats will – what will we be left with? Politicisation of their descent, a mockery of their caste, or just an attitude of indifference towards them, for those who did not win a medal, aren’t worth remembering, and those who did are worth for some hours more. Whilst I can enlist each series India has won or lost and the events inter-alia. In a population of half a billion adults who have access to some sort of media, 1 million saw the Olympics. Guess the number that clocked in for the Test Championship? And no one is to blame, as we are the perpetrators as a community. We are a class of sloganeers, an age of idol-creators, a community of tweeters and followers, what we aren’t is that we are not beholders of this beauty that we witnessed in the past 2 weeks.

A tweet is doing the rounds, “There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.” And thus, what shall we wait for – the decade or the week? Will in this coming decade more parents send their children towards sports. Forget “them”, in the next decade the ones reading this most likely would be parents, I will be a parent – will they, will I – maybe now I say yes, the Halo Effect – but what about a decade later, and the next decade or the decade thence? So, again we will wait for a week that will define the entire decade, or more to come. We will wait for those weeks to make ourselves proud, proud of the bygone 520 weeks where we did nothing to deserve this 1. Thus, and thus, it will happen again, or not – no one knows.

No one in their right minds can take anything away from these sportspersons, neither their glory nor their vain. What will erase is a meek show of profound vanity that we presumed has exculpated us from all those years of wilful turning away the eye. Whether or not we expunge these stars from our horizon or not, they will shine bright for those who have a cloudless conscience and a penchant to look in the right direction.

The epitaph of one of history’s greatest astronomers Sir William Herschel reads, “Coelorum Perrupit Claustra” (he broke through the confines of heaven) – similarly maybe someday our stars will break free from their asylums of obscurity, and we from our ceilings of sporadic sincerity.

Olympics, sports, and those who profess it are too venerable to be compared with the adage “-gasm”, and if taken as profanity, then with apologies, I will beg to differ. However, when scribbling the details that’s what kept coming to me – these past weeks were just moments of elation, a spurt of joy, a plateau of comradery, and then will decline into just a thing once. “La petit mort”shouldn’t be how we treat our athletes, and gratification from them isn’t what we should treat ourselves too either.

And till the next fortnight of glory – let us let the whoosh of the javelin in air, the burn of the skids of track, the scoops of the sticks, the swoosh of the shuttle, the twangs of the bows, the recoils of the guns, the force of the pins, the elegance of the jumps, and above all the sacrifice, courage, valour and achievement of these men and women, from amongst us be the clarion call that was essential but was being ignored.

Let’s Wake Up!