India at Asian Games 2023 - top five moments

Indias Satwiksairaj Rankireddy (L) and Chirag Shetty celebrate after winning gold at the 2023 Asian Games. | Photo Credit: AFP

The 20th Asian Games will be held in Aichi-Nagoya, Japan, from September 19 to October 4.

India will field a 503-strong contingent at the continental competition and will look to better its best-ever haul of 70 medals it managed at the previous edition in Hangzhou, China, in 2023.

Here are the top five Indian moments from the previous Asian Games:

Roar of the underdogs

Ayhika Mukherjee and Sutirtha Mukherjee (left) stunned China’s Chen Meng and Wang Yidi in women’s table-tennis doubles quartrfinal. | Photo Credit: PTI

There’s more than a touch of irony in the fact that one of India’s greatest sporting moments, not just at the Asian Games but arguably in recent years, would ultimately be rewarded with ‘just’ a bronze medal.

To beat any Chinese player in an international table tennis match is hard. To beat China in a medal match at a major competition is harder. To beat a Chinese pair who have just been crowned world champions in a medal match in China is almost unthinkable.

To say that Ayhika Mukherjee and Sutirtha Mukherjee were underdogs in their doubles quarterfinal match against China’s Chen Meng and Wang Yidi would be an understatement. They were massive underdogs. Meng is a two-time Olympic champion, and partnering Yidi, had just won gold in the World Championships.

As it turns out, it was the Chinese who were left flummoxed by the Indians, who have only been playing together for less than a year. The two Indians didn’t just creep over the finish line, they bullied the Chinese pair over the course of four games.

While the Indians wouldn’t go past the next hurdle, losing to a North Korean pair, they had made a big enough statement on the 9-by-5-foot table that would echo well beyond the Games.

Clean sweep for the archers

Gold medallist Indian women archers Jyothi Surekha Vennam, Parneet Kaur and Aditi Gopichand Swami pose for photos with gold-medal-winning compatriots Ojas Pravin Deotale, Prathamesh Samadhan Jawkar and Abhishek Verma, and coaches Sergio Pagni and Sanjeeva Singh after the Compound Archery team events at the 19th Asian Games. | Photo Credit: PTI

In the 11 editions of archery competitions at the Asian Games, Japan only topped the charts in 1978 before South Korea displaced it for good. Until now. As the 2023 edition officially came to a close, it was India that beamed proudly on top, having swept all five gold medals on offer in the compound archery events!

In the men’s individual final, it was two Indians—Ojas Deotale and Abhishek Verma—who were facing each other. In fact, the prospect of an all-women individual final was probably denied because Jyothi Surekha Vennam and Aditi Swami faced each other in the semifinal. The recurve archers, too, medalled silver and bronze.

India bagged nine medals in total, and they beat the lot – Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong, Kazakhstan, and Saudi Arabia. The whole lot!

The first gold came from the mixed team of Jyothi and Ojas, who beat Korea’s Jaehoon Joo and So Chaewon. And it was Jyothi and Ojas who finished with a rare triple gold by claiming individual, team and mixed team golds.

Satwik-Chirag juggernaut

India’s Satwiksairaj Rankireddy (L) and Chirag Shetty pose following the badminton men’s doubles final at the Hangzhou 2022 Asian Games. | Photo Credit: AFP

Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty punctuated their stellar 2023 by winning the Asian Games gold—India’s first in the continental Games.

En route to the gold, Chirag and Satwik even beat their archnemeses, Aaron Chia and Soh Wooi Yik from Malaysia, who held an 8-1 superior advantage over the Indian pair before the semifinal.

It was a close battle until the 10-all mark of the opening game before Chirag and Satwik rolled the Malaysian pair over for a swift 21-17, 21-12 win. The manner of victory seemed so routine that the neutral supporters in the venue became subdued by the one-sided dominance of the Indians. The win also confirmed their status as the world no. 1 doubles pair. 

India coach Pullela Gopichand felt the gold at the Asian Games is tougher than winning one at the Olympics. “For me, the Asian Games are tougher than the Olympics. I’m very happy they peaked at the right time. If you look at the competition, teams such as Malaysia, Korea, Japan, and Indonesia send two teams. In all, there were nine nations here that sent two teams, which is not the case at the Olympics,” said Gopichand.

A clinical display

Indian shooter Sift Kaur Samra poses for photos with her gold medal during the presentation ceremony of the women's 50m rifle 3 positions event at the 19th Asian Games. | Photo Credit: PTI

Sift Kaur Samra broke the world record to secure gold in the women’s 50m 3P event at the 2023 Asian Games. The Indian first finished second in qualifying with 594 points, giving up first place to China’s Xia Siyu only on the basis of fewer inner tens. In the final, though, she wouldn’t come close to being caught. Samra took the early lead at the end of the kneeling event and held it all the way to the end.

While the then-reigning world champion Zhang Qiongyue struggled to stay within range, Samra ruthlessly kept extending her lead. Eventually, she was so far ahead of the rest of the field that she could arguably even afford to have missed one shot. Not that she ever did. In her last three shots, Samra first scored two near-perfect 10.8s before closing the show with a 10.2. Qiongyue finished a distant second with a final shot of just 9.9.

Samra finished with a score of 469.6 — a mammoth 7.3 ahead of the reigning world champion. Samra’s score wasn’t just incredible at the Asian level, she had smashed the old world record (467) by 2.6 points.

Shaking a leg

India’s HS Prannoy celebrates after winning his match against South Korea's Jeon Hyeok-jin. | Photo Credit: PTI

The DJ at Hangzhou’s Binjiang Gymnasium couldn’t have chosen a better song for the moment. As H. S. Prannoy ripped off his T-shirt and threw his arms in the air after finally beating former All England champion Lee Zii Jia in the quarterfinal of the men’s singles competition at the Asian Games, the speakers inside the arena belted out the title song from the movie Dangal.

The Amir Khan-starrer had been a runaway success in Chinese theatres; at one time, it was the highest-grossing foreign-made film in the country.

There couldn’t have been a more appropriate soundtrack to celebrate another Indian’s success in China.

By beating Lee, Prannoy had become just the second Indian men’s singles player to medal at the Asian Games and the first since the legendary Syed Modi in 1982.

The match was brutal for both players. Prannoy had long been seen as a player who was capable of pulling off upsets but was unable to win the matches that mattered. He had more than enough reason to justify a loss in Hangzhou. He had been battling a niggle in his back, and indeed, once the shirt was off, you could see the heavy strapping all over it.

That wouldn’t stop him, though. As he swayed to the beats of Dangal, Prannoy proved he is well and truly able to dance in the big leagues.