India will be without two of the six individual athletes who contributed to the country’s record medal haul at the Tokyo Olympics.

India will send over 111 competitors to the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. However, it is confirmed that there will be fewer Indian competitors competing this time around than the 124 who competed in the Tokyo Olympics. India would be looking to equal its record seven medal haul from the Tokyo Olympics. Nonetheless, a number of well-known Indian athletes have stated that they will not be competing in Paris this year for various reasons. Here, we examine five of these well-known figures.

Ravi Dahiya:

This man lost his match in the selection trials for the Asian Olympic qualifiers in March of this year. After becoming just the second wrestler from India to win a silver medal, he expressed his disappointment at not winning the gold. Dahiya was only making his comeback from a protracted injury, while Aman Shehrawat, his opponent, was in excellent shape and had medalled in nearly all of his competitions in 2023. Shehrawat will compete for India in Paris after winning the 57 kg men’s freestyle quota.

Bajrang Punia:

In March of this year, Punia too failed the selection test, just like Dahiya. At the Tokyo Olympics, Punia was the heavy favorite to win gold, thus his bronze in the 65kg weight class was somewhat of a surprise. Punia, a well-known protester against previous WFI President Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, lost badly to Rohit Kumar in the men’s freestyle 65 kg semifinal at this year’s trials, falling short 1-9. The WFI’s decision to cancel a second trial following the Asian Olympic qualifiers dealt a fatal blow to Punia and Dahiya’s prospects.

Murali Sreesahankar:

Last year, at the Asian Athletics Championships 2023 in Bangkok, Thailand, Murali Sreesahankar broke the men’s long jump qualifying standard of 8.27 meters, earning him a spot in the Olympics unlike Punia and Dahiya. He won silver at the meet with a time of 8.37 meters. But because of an injury he received during practice in April of this year, he was forced to rule himself out of the Games and the remainder of the 2024 season.

Kidambi Srikanth: This is the second time in a row that the former World No. 1 has missed an Olympics. Ten of the eleven BWF World Tour events this year, including the All England Open in Match, saw Srikanth lose in the first or second round. He did not place among the top 16, which was the required minimum to qualify. In order to join HS Prannoy as one of just two Indians eligible to compete in men’s singles, even if he had made it, he would have needed to place at least one place higher than Lakshya Sen’s 13th place performance.

Women’s hockey team: 

The Indian women’s hockey team finished a historic fourth at the Tokyo Olympics, equalling their best-ever result and missing out on a medal by a whisker. While they received a rousing welcome, this was followed by some turmoil within the team with captain Rani Rampal being practically frozen out of the side by coach Janneke Schopmann after the Tokyo Games. Missing out on gold at the Asian Games meant that India had to go through an Olympic qualifier to book tickets to Paris. The country hosted the qualifiers and yet, India first lost to Germany in a penalty shootout, which ruled them out of finishing in the top two. They then had to beat Japan to secure third but ended up losing 1-0, thus ending their hopes of making it to a third consecutive Olympics.sportsp