India must expand Olympic sports participation to boost medal haul: PM Modi

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday urged India to increase its participation in Olympic sports, describing the country's limited involvement across disciplines as a "bitter truth" that has persisted for decades.

Addressing hundreds of athletes, students and volunteers gathered virtually for the Khelo India Dialogue, Modi highlighted a significant gap in India's Olympic engagement. "In the Olympics, there are so many different sports... Indian teams don't even participate in half of them," he said. At the 2024 Paris Olympics, India competed in 16 of the 32 sports on the Games roster.

Modi said India's Olympic prospects cannot improve without tackling this structural limitation. "We don't even compete for a huge chunk of the medal tally. And this has been going on for decades. Other countries of the world win medals in those sports, and we don't even participate in them," the Prime Minister noted.

Beyond medal maximisation, Modi framed sports development as integral to nation-building. His vision extends beyond athletic achievement to positioning sports as a cornerstone of India's broader developmental agenda, requiring systematic investment in emerging sporting disciplines where India currently has minimal presence or competitive infrastructure.