Olympics-The India Story

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Olympics-The India Story Page 43

by Boria Majumdar


  11. For details on the impact of the ‘Games Ethic’ on the colonies see, J.A. Mangan, The Games Ethic and Imperialism (London: Frank Cass, 2001); Brian Stoddart, ‘Sport, Colonialism and Struggle: CLR James and Cricket’, Sport in Society, 9 (5), 2006, pp. 914–30.

  12. See Cecil Headlam, Ten Thousand Miles through India and Burma: An Account of the Oxford University Cricket Tour with Mr K. J. Kay in the Year of the Coronation Durbar (London, 1903).

  13. J.A. Mangan (ed.), The Cultural Bond: Sport, Empire, Society (London and Portland, OR: Frank Cass, 1992), p. 8.

  14. Personal letter from Dorabji Tata to the IOC president, Count Baillet Latour, 21 May 1929. Housed at the International Olympic Museum, Lausanne, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  15. Ibid.

  16. See the letters in ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930, International Olympic Museum, Lausanne.

  17. Personal letter from Dorab J. Tata to the IOC president, Count Baillet Latour, 21 May 1929. Housed at the International Olympic Museum, Lausanne, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  18. Ibid.

  19. The Statesman, 3 June 1920, ‘Indian Athletes at the Olympic Games: Team of Six from Bombay’.

  20. Ibid.

  21. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 30 August 1920.

  22. Ibid.

  23. Letter from A.G. Noehren to Dorabji J. Tata on 1 April 1924 housed at the International Olympic Museum, Lausanne. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center, IOC Museum, Lausanne. This file deals primarily with correspondence exchanged between the Indian Olympic Association and the International Olympic Committee. Also, all documents sent from India to the IOC—letters, pamphlets, constitutions etc have been retained in this file. Also see IDD Chemise 9404 CIO CNO INDE CORR, Correspondence India 1924-1963.

  24. Ibid.

  25. Ibid.

  26. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 18 January 1924.

  27. Ibid., 13 February 1924.

  28. Saradindu Sanyal, ‘India and the Olympics’, in XVIII Olympiad Tokyo 1964: Official Souvenir of the Indian Olympic Association: (Mumbai: Sportswriters Publishers, 1964), pp. 25–26.

  29. Ibid.

  30. Cesar Torres, ‘The Latin American Olympic Explosion in the 1920s: Causes and Consequences’, in Boria Majumdar and Sandra Collins (eds.), Olympism: The Global Vision: From Nationalism to Internationalism, Special Issue, The International Journal of the History of Sport, 23, (7), November 2006, pp. 1088–94.

  31. Personal letter from Elswood S. Brown to Pierre De Coubertin, 3 February 1919, ‘Young Men’s Christian Associations. 1909–1927’ (hereafter YMCA, 1909–1927), IOC Archives, Lausanne.

  32. Personal letter from Elswood S. Brown to Pierre De Coubertin, 23 January 1929, (YMCA, 1909–1927), IOC Archives, Lausanne.

  33. (YMCA, 1909–1927), IOC Archives, Lausanne.

  34. Anthony S. De Mello, ‘In the Ramayana and Mahabharata: Nehru’s Favourite’, in Portrait of Indian Sport (New Delhi: Macmillan 1959), p. 99.

  35. Personal letter from Henry Gray to Count Baillet Latour, 28 December 1928. IOC Archives, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  36. IOC Archives, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  37. Personal letter from Dorabji J. Tata to the IOC president, Count Baillet Latour, 21 May 1929. Housed at the International Olympic Museum, Lausanne, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  38. Personal letter from Dorabji J. Tata to the IOC president Count Baillet Latour, 21 Feb 1927. Housed at the International Olympic Museum, Lausanne, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  39. For details on the stadium controversy see; Boria Majumdar, Twenty Two Yards to Freedom: A Social History of Indian Cricket (New Delhi: Penguin Viking, 2004), pp. 171–99.

  40. IOC Archives, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  41. Personal letter from IOC president to Sir Dorabji Tata, 22 April 1927. The IOC chief thanked Tata for his wonderful work in promoting the Olympic cause in India and indicated that the IOC was aware of the difficulties involved in replacing Sir Dorab with someone equally capable and equal to the task of assuming effective control of the Olympic movement in India. IOC Archives, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  42. For details see; Boria Majumdar, Twenty Two Yards to Freedom: A Social History of Indian Cricket (New Delhi: Penguin Viking, 2004), Chapter 1.

  43. Personal letter from IOC President to Sir Dorabji Tata, 22 April 1927. IOC Archives, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  44. For details see Boria Majumdar and Kausik Bandyopadhyay, Goalless: The Story of a Unique Footballing Nation (New Delhi: Penguin Viking, 2006), Chapter 4.

  45. For most of his letters see IOC Archives, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  46. Personal letter from Sir Dorabji Tata to Count Baillet Latour, Geneva, 16 June 1927. IOC Archives, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930. Also see; File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center, IOC Museum, Lausanne.

  47. Ibid.

  48. IOC Archives, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930. Also see; File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  49. For details of the Ranji-Patiala proximity see; Boria Majumdar, Twenty Two Yards to Freedom: A Social History of Indian Cricket, (New Delhi: Penguin Viking, 2004), p. 62.

  50. Personal letter from Sir Dorabji Tata to Count Baillet Latour on 13 September 1927. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  51. Personal letter from Sir Dorabji Tata to Count Baillet Latour on 17 Jan. 1928. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  52. Anthony S. De Mello, ‘A Wardrobe of Coloured Blazers’, in Portrait of Indian Sport, (New Delhi: Macmillan 1959), pp. 48–49.

  53. Ibid.

  54. Ibid.

  55. Ibid.

  56. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  57. All quotes in this paragraph are from a personal letter from Henry Gray to Count Baillet Latour, 28 December 1928. IOC Archives, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  58. IOC Archives, IDD Chemise 9404 CIO CNO INDE CORR, Correspondence India 1924–1963.

  59. Personal letter from IOC President to Dorabji Tata on 11 May 1929. IOC Archives, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930.

  60. Personal letter from Sir Dorabji Tata to Count Baillet Latour, 21 May 1929 and letter from Sir Dorabji Tata to the Maharaja of Patiala on 6 May 1931. IOC Archives, ID Chemise 7334 CIO 3535 MBR-TATA-CORR, Correspondence de Dorabji Tata 1926–1930 and File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  61. IOC Archives, IDD Chemise 9404 CIO CNO INDE CORR, Correspondence India 1924–1963.

  62. John J. Macaloon, ‘Introduction’, Revised and Updated edition of This Great Symbol: Pierre De Coubertin and the Origins of the Modern Olympic Games, Special Issue, The International Journal of the History of Sport, 23 (3–4), 2006, p. 344.

  63. Rosalind O ‘Hanlon, ‘Issues of Masculinity in North Indian History: The Bangash Nawabs of Farrukhabad’, in Indian Journal of Gender Studies 4 (1), (New Delhi: Sage, 1997).

  CHAPTER 2

  1. For details see Boria Majumdar and Kausik Bandyopadhyay, Goalless: The Story of a Unique Footballing Nation (New Delhi: Penguin Viking, 2006), Chapter 4.

  2. Ibid.

  3. The First Western Asiatic Games was held in New Delhi on 2–3 March 1934 under the patronage of the Indian Olympic
Association.

  4. Gupta, for example, was the secretary of the Bengal Hockey Association, represented the Indian Football Association at major meetings throughout the 1930s and was also a key power broker in the Cricket Association of Bengal and also the Board of Control for Cricket in India.

  5. Letter from G.D. Sondhi to the IOC president, 30 March 1931. Housed at the International Olympic Museum, Lausanne. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center, IOC Museum, Lausanne. This file deals primarily with correspondence exchanged between the Indian Olympic Association and the International Olympic Committee. Any document sent from India to the IOC—letters, pamphlets, constitutions etc—have been retained in this file. Also see IDD Chemise 9404 CIO CNO INDE CORR, Correspondence India 1924–1963.

  6. Sondhi to De Coubertin, 17 January 1934. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  7. Sondhi to De Coubertin, 14 March 1934. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  8. Sondhi to De Coubertin, 31 May 1934. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  9. Minutes of F.I.N.A. meeting 8–9 May 1935. This is also housed at the IOC Museum, Lausanne, is part of the India correspondence. IDD Chemise 9404 CIO CNO INDE CORR, Correspondence India 1924–1963.

  10. Sondhi to Count Baillet Latour, 2 July 1935. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  11. Ibid.

  12. Sondhi to honorary secretary, FINA, 29 June, 1935. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  13. Sondhi to Count Baillet Latour, 2 July 1935. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  14. Ibid.

  15. Ibid.

  16. Letter from S.Y. Sircar, joint secretary of the National Swimming Association to Count Baillet Latour, 16 September 1935. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  17. Ibid.

  18. Letter from the Secretary of the Hatkhola Club to the Secretary of the International Olympic Committee, 28 March 1938. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  19. Letter from the secretary of the Hatkhola Club to the secretary of the International Olympic Committee, 28 March 1938. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  20. Letter from the secretary of the Hatkhola Club to the Secretary of the International Olympic Committee, 28 March 1938. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  21. Ibid.

  22. Ibid.

  23. Letter from Pankaj Gupta to Count Baillet Latour, Date not found. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  24. Ibid.

  25. Sondhi to Pankaj Gupta, 16 June 1939. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  26. Ibid.

  27. Ibid.

  28. Ibid.

  29. Ibid.

  30. Sondhi to Count Baillet Latour, 17 June 1939. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  31. Ibid.

  32. Tokyo and Helsinki had been awarded the 1940 and 1944 Olympiads respectively before the world war resulted in the cancellation of these games.

  33. Sondhi to Count Baillet Latour, 17 June 1939. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  34. Correspondence of Sohrab H. Bhoot with the IOC President Avery Brundage. IDD Chemise 9404 CIO CNO INDE CORR, Correspondence India 1924–1963.

  35. Raja Bhalindra Singh, president, IOA, to Avery Brundage, president, IOC, 4 October 1958 CIO MBR SINGH CORR OU MO 01 4107 SINGH, Bhalindra Raja Correspondence 1947–1985.

  36. Correspondence of Sohrab H. Bhoot with the IOC president, Avery Brundage. IDD Chemise 9404 CIO CNO INDE CORR, Correspondence India 1924–1963.

  37. Raja Bhalindra Singh, president, IOA to Avery Brundage, president, IOC, 4 October 1958. CIO MBR SINGH CORR OU MO 01 4107 SINGH, Bhalindra Raja Correspondence 1947–1985

  38. Correspondence of Sohrab H. Bhoot with the IOC president, Avery Brundage. IDD Chemise 9404 CIO CNO INDE CORR, Correspondence India 1924–1963.

  39. For details see; ‘Play the Game in the spirit of the Game: First Asian Games–New Delhi 1951’, Anthony S. De Mello, Portrait of Indian Sport, (New Delhi: Macmillan, 1959).

  40. http://www.cyclingfederationofindia.org/, accessed 10 August 2007.

  41. Raja Bhalindra Singh, president, IOA, to Avery Brundage, president, IOC, 4 October 1958 CIO MBR SINGH CORR OU MO 01 4107 SINGH, Bhalindra Raja Correspondence 1947–1985

  42. ‘Sports News and Views of the Day by Leon’, the Times of India, 25 September 1953, quoted in Ibid.

  43. Raja Bhalindra Singh, president, IOA, to Avery Brundage, president, IOC, 4 October 1958. CIO MBR SINGH CORR OU MO 01 4107 SINGH, Bhalindra Raja Correspondence 1947–1985

  44. Raja Bhalindra Singh, president, IOA to Avery Brundage, president, IOC, 4 October 1958. CIO MBR SINGH CORR OU MO 01 4107 SINGH, Bhalindra Raja Correspondence 1947–1985.

  45. Raja Bhalindra Singh, president, IOA to Avery Brundage, president, IOC, 4 October 1958. CIO MBR SINGH CORR OU MO 01 4107 SINGH, Bhalindra Raja Correspondence 1947–1985

  46. Letter to IOA from chairman, Warsaw—Berlin—Prague Road Race, 22 November 1955. Quoted in Ibid.

  47. Raja Bhalindra Singh, president, IOA to Avery Brundage, president, IOC,4 October 1958. CIO MBR SINGH CORR OU MO 01 4107 SINGH, Bhalindra Raja Correspondence 1947–1985.

  48. Raja Bhalindra Singh, president, IOA, to Avery Brundage, president, IOC,4 October 1958. CIO MBR SINGH CORR OU MO 01 4107 SINGH, Bhalindra Raja Correspondence 1947–1985

  49. Ibid.

  50. Letter from Sohrab H. Bhoot to the president and members of the IOC executive committee, 26 September 1956. IDD Chemise 9404 CIO CNO INDE CORR, Correspondence India 1924–1963.

  51. Ibid.

  52. Ibid.

  53. Ibid.

  54. Ibid.

  55. http://www.cyclingfederationofindia.org/ accessed 10 August 2007.

  56. Ibid.

  CHAPTER 3

  1. Review of the 1932 Olympic expedition by the president of the IHF, A.M. Hayman housed at the International Olympic Museum, Lausanne. File OU MO 01 14 36, CIO CNO IND CORR, Olympic Studies Center.

  2. Rajdeep Sardesai, the Sunday Times of India, 1992

  3. The magazines of the Presidency and St Xavier’s Colleges in Calcutta between 1920 and 1940 are full of praise for the Indian hockey team’s performance at the Olympics.

  4. For details see; ‘We Climb the Victory Stand: Hockey in Excelsis’, in Anthony S. De Mello, Portrait of Indian Sport, (New Delhi: Macmillan,

  1959).

  5. Dhyan Chand, Goal, published in Sport and Pastime, 1952. The book has been digitized and is available in http://www.bharatiyahockey.org/granthalaya/goal/, accessed 10 September 2007.

  6. For details see; ‘We Climb the Victory Stand: Hockey in Excelsis’, op. cit., p. 82.

  7. Ibid.

  8. Ibid., p. 83.

  9. For details see C.D. Parthasarathy, ‘Indian Hockey: Rise and Fall’, in Sport and Pastime, 16 February 1963.

  10. Dhyan Chand, Goal, op. cit. .

  11. ‘We Climb the Victory Stand. . .’, op. cit., p. 85.

  12. Ramachandra Guha, India After Gandhi: The History of the World’s Largest Democracy (New Delhi: Picador, 2007), pp. 115–16

  13. Subroto Sirkar, ‘They came. . .they played. . .they conquered’, World Hockey, 13 March 1995, p.8.

  14. For details see Dhyan Chand, Goal op. cit. .

  15. Notes from Jaipal’s Singh’s memoirs passed on to us by Amar Singh, Jaipal Singh’s son, then secretary of the CC Morris Cricket Library, Pennsylvania in 2001. The memoirs were later edited by Rashmi Katyayan and published by Prabhat Khabar Publications, Ranchi, 2004.

  16. Rashmi Katyayan (ed.), Lo Bir Sendra (Ranchi: Prabhat Khabar Publications, 2004), p. 35.

  17. Lo Bir Sendra, op. cit., pp. 35–37.

  18. Dhyan Chand, Goal, op. cit. .
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  19. The Statesman, 19 May 1928, p. 11.

  20. Ibid.

  21. The Statesman, 29 May 1928, p. 14.

  22. Personal interview with Amar Singh, 2001, Jaipal Singh’s life has quite a few unsolved mysteries. For example Jaipal’s real name was Pramod Pahan. Later his name was changed to Jaipal and even he isn’t sure why this happened. On Jaipal not playing in the final of the 1928 Olympiad Dhyan Chand writes in his memoirs, ‘Jaipal Singh, I believe, used to fly from London to Amsterdam most of the time, returning after the match was over. It is still a mystery to me why Jaipal Singh, after ably captaining us in England, and in two of the three matches in the Olympic Games, suddenly left us. I have heard many stories, but so far I have not had the truth.’ He later hints that ‘communal and racial issues’ might have been involved in Jaipal’s sudden absence. According to Dhyan Chand, the only person who could clear the mystery was Jaipal himself. But Jaipal merely says in his autobiography that on his return to London from the Olympics, Lord Irwin, Viceroy of India, congratulated him personally.

  23. The Statesman, 29 May 1928, p. 14.

  24. Dhyan Chand, Goal, published in Sport and Pastime, 1952, Section on the 1928 Amsterdam Olympiad.

  25. England did not participate in the hockey competition for the 1932 and 1936 games. The Games were not held thereafter till 1948, due to WWII.

  26. A series of reports were published in the Times of India commenting on the significance of this victory against England in 1948. It was considered a great gift from the team for the people of the newly independent nation.

  27. C.D. Parthasarathy, ‘That Golden Age’, in Sport and Pastime, 23 February 1963.

  28. Quoted in C.D. Parthasarathy, ‘Indian Hockey: Rise and Fall’, in Sport and Pastime, 16 February 1963.

  29. Rashmi Katyayan (ed.), Lo Bir Sendra (Ranchi: Prabhat Khabar Publications, 2004), p. 37.

  30. For details see; Dhyan Chand, Goal, published in Sport and Pastime, 1952, Section on the 1928 Amsterdam Olympiad.

  31. Rashmi Katyayan, op. cit. p. 38.

  32. Ramachandra Guha, India After Gandhi: The History of the World’s Largest Democracy (New Delhi: Picador, 2007), pp. 115–16.

 

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