Indian wrestlers finally reach Sofia for final Olympic qualifying event
The team’s participation at the World Olympic Games Qualifiers was in doubt after several European countries imposed bans on Indian travelers
A 12-member Indian wrestling team has finally landed in Sofia, Bulgaria, where they are set to participate in the World Olympic Games Qualifiers, which will begin on May 6, 2021.
The team’s participation in the last Olympic qualifying event was in doubt after several European countries imposed bans on Indian travelers due to a spike in Coronavirus cases.
They were supposed to travel via Amsterdam, but the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) assistant secretary Vinod Tomar informed that the concerned airlines had cancelled the tickets as the Netherlands government banned Indian travelers from entering the country.
“Our president (Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh) approached the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA). Following negotiations with the Dutch and French embassies, both countries relaxed travel formalities for the Indian wrestlers on a priority basis,” Tomar said.
“Finally, we booked the tickets on a flight via Paris and our wrestlers boarded the flight on Thursday night.”
India has already booked six Tokyo 2020 quota places through Ravi Dahiya (men’s 57kg), Bajrang Punia (65kg), Deepak Punia (86kg), Vinesh Phogat (women’s 53 kg), Anshu Malik (57kg) and Sonam Malik (62kg) for Tokyo 2020.
Six more -- Amit Dhankar (74kg), Satywart Kadiyan (97kg) and Sumit Malik (125kg) in men’s freestyle and Seema (50kg), Nisha Dahiya (68kg) and Pooja Sihag (76kg) in women’s freestyle -- will now hope to secure their Olympic quotas.
In the Greco-Roman category, India will be represented by Rana (60kg), Aashu (67kg), Gurpreet Singh (77kg), Sunil (87kg), Deepanshu (97kg) and Naveen Kumar (130kg). The country has not yet won a single Olympic quota in Greco-Roman.
Wrestling has been one of the crucial medal sports for India in the past few Olympics.
Fifty-six years after KD Jadhav won a bronze at the 1952 Olympic Games in Helsinki, India won an Olympic medal in wrestling when Sushil Kumar bagged the bronze in the 66kg category at the Beijing Games. Having ended the drought, India has won at least one medal in the sport since.
Sushil added to his medal haul by winning a silver at London 2012 while Yogeshwar Dutt (60kg) won a bronze in the same edition. At Rio 2016, Sakshi Malik became the first Indian female wrestler to win an Olympic medal when she claimed a bronze in the 58kg weight category.