Sports were never a priority for an India, which got its freedom from the reigns of British and their 200-year-long rule. Let alone of priority, but India never even had the proper infrastructure required to support sports and those who wish to pursue them. Year by year and decade by decade, the Indian sub-continent started producing podium contenders across various sports and tournaments.
78 years since Independence, Indian sporting heroes came up with several glorious moments that etched their name in history forever. Let’s have a look at the top 78 glorious moments in Indian sporting history since Independence in 1947.
August 12, 1948
Indian men’s hockey team under the captaincy of Kishan Lal, defeated Great Britain to win a gold medal at London Olympics and clinched their first Olympic gold.
1951
India hosted first Asian Games in 1951 in Delhi.
March 7, 1951
Sachin Nag won India’s first gold at the 1951 Asian Games.
July 23, 1952
Wrestler KD Jadhav won independent India’s first individual Olympics medal, when he secured a bronze in the flyweight category at the 1952 edition in Helsinki.
July 24, 1952
India defeated Holland to win the Olympic Hockey Championships and retain the world title.
December 6, 1956
Indian hockey team won sixth consecutive Olympics gold at the 1956 Melbourne edition.
July 24, 1958
Milkha Singh won the first individual gold for India at the 1958 Commonwealth Games.
July 28, 1960
Ramanathhan Krishnan became the first Indian to reach the semi-finals of a Grand Slam event in Wimbledon.
September 4, 1962
Indian men’s football team won gold at the Jakarta Asian Games.
October 23, 1964
Indian hockey team defeated Pakistan to win another gold at the Olympics.
1964
Jeremy Bujakowski became the first athlete to represent India in the Winter Olympics.
1966
India finished as runners-up in Davis Cup. They lost the final to Australia.
1967-68
India won first ever Test series away from home in New Zealand.
December 14, 1970
Kamaljeet Sandhu won the 400m gold at the Bangkok Asian Games.
March 11, 1971
Indian cricket team won first Test series in West Indies.
September 12, 1974
T.C. Yohannan won gold in long jump at Tehran Asian Games.
1975
India won the Hockey World Championships for the first time ever.
1978
Michael Ferreira became the first player to surpass 1000 points barrier in National Billiards Championship.
1980
Prakash Padukone won the All England Badminton Open. He defeated reigning champion Liem Swie King.
July 29, 1980
Indian hockey team defeated Spain to win gold at Summer Olympics in Moscow.
1982
India recorded first big achievement in golf by winning gold at Asian Games.
June 25, 1983
Indian cricket team, under the captaincy of Kapil Dev won its first ODI World Cup title after defeating West India in the final.
1984
PT Usha missed out on her Olympic bronze by just 0.01 second and finished fourth in 400m hurdles.
March 10, 1985
Indian cricket team won the Benson and Hedges World Championship.
October 4, 1986
P.T. Usha won four gold medals and a silver medal at the Seoul Asian Games.
September 25, 1986
Khajan Singh won the historic gold in swimming at the Asian Games.
March 7, 1987
Sunil Gavaskar became the first batter to record 10,000 Test runs.
1988
Viswanathan Anand became India’s first chess Grandmaster.
1994
Karnam Malleswari became the first Indian to win Weightlifting World Championships gold.
August 3, 1996
Leander Paes won bronze at the Atlanta Olympics.
1998
Milkha Singh became the first Indian to participate in the European Tour.
1998
Shiva Keshavan became the youngest person overall and first Indian to qualify for Olympics in luge.
1998
Dingko Singh won India’s first boxing gold in 16 years at Asiad.
February 7, 1999
Anil Kumble scalped historic 10 wickets to register a win against Pakistan.
1999
Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupati reached men’s doubles finals of all four Grand Slams and won French Open and Wimbledon.
September 19, 2000
Karnam Malleswari became India’s first-ever woman Olympic medallist by winning a bronze in Sydney.
December 24, 2000
Viswanathan Anand became the first Asian to win the World Chess Championships.
March 11, 2001
Pullela Gopichand won All-England Championships and became the second Indian to do so.
2002
Indian women’s hockey team won gold at Commonwealth Games.
August 25, 2002
Anjali Vedpathak won the ‘Champion of Champions’ title at Munich World Cup final.
August 30, 2003
Anju Bobby George won bronze in long jump at the IAAF World Championships.
August 14, 2004
Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore won India’s first Olympic shooting medal, a silver in double trap at the Athens edition.
March 6, 2005
Narain Karthikeyan made his Formula 1 debut with Jordan. With this he became India’s first Formula 1 racer.
June 2, 2006
Geet Sethi became the Billiards World Champion for the fifth time.
December 7-8, 2006
Jaspal Rana won three golds and one silver medal at the 2006 Doha Asian Games.
September 24, 2007
MS Dhoni-led Indian team defeated Pakistan to win inaugural T20 World Cup.
April 18, 2008
The first-ever IPL match took place at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium where Brendon McCullum played a blazing knock of 158 runs.
August 11, 2008
Abhinav Bindra won India’s first ever individual Olympic gold.
August 20, 2008
Sushil Kumar won bronze medal in 66kg freestyle wrestling at Beijing Olympics.
August 22, 2008
Vijender Singh won bronze medal in 75kg boxing at the Beijing Olympics.
2009
Sania Mirza became the first Indian woman to win a Grand Slam.
February 24, 2010
Sachin Tendulkar became the first Indian to hit ODI double century.
2010
India hosted the Commonwealth Games for the first time in history.
2010
Ashish Kumar won India’s first gymnastics medals at Asian Games and Commonwealth Games.
April 2, 2011
MS Dhoni-led Indian cricket team defeated Sri Lanka to win the ODI World Cup 2011, after a gap of 28 years.
August 14, 2011
Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa won bronze at the World Badminton Championships.
July 29, 2012
Gagan Narang won bronze at the London Olympics in 10m air rifle.
August 3, 2012
Vijay Kumar won Olympic silver at the London Olympics in 25m rapid fire pistol.
August 9, 2012
Saina Nehwal won bronze at London Olympics, became the first Indian badminton player win an Olympic medal.
August 8, 2012
Mary Kom won bronze in boxing at London Olympics.
August 11, 2012
Yogeshwar Dutt won bronze at London Olympics.
2015
Sania Mirza crowned World Number 1 in women’s doubles tennis.
August 14, 2016
Dipa Karmarkar secured historic fourth-place finish at Rio Olympics.
August 17, 2016
Sakshi Malik won bronze medal at Rio Olympics, became first Indian female wrestler to win an Olympic medal.
April 14, 2018
Manika Batra won India’s first table tennis gold in women’s singles at the 2018 Commonwealth Games.
August 25, 2019
PV Sindhu became a World Champion.
August 26-28, 2019
GM Koneru Humpy became the women’s world rapid chess champion.
December 17, 2020-January 19, 2021
India registered an epic Test win against Australia in Gabba.
July 24, 2021
Mirabai Chanu won silver at 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
August 1, 2021
PV Sindhu won bronze at Tokyo Olympics; became first Indian woman to win two consecutive individual Olympic medals.
August 4, 2021
Lovlina Borgohain won bronze at Tokyo Olympics.
August 5, 2021
India defeated Germany to win men’s hockey Olympics bronze; ended India hockey’s 41-year-long Olympics medal drought.
August 5, 2021
Ravi Kumar Dahiya won silver at Tokyo Games.
August 7, 2021
Neeraj Chopra became an Olympic champion; won gold at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.
August 7, 2021
Bajrang Punia won bronze on debut at Tokyo Olympics.
May 19, 2022
Nikhat Zareen became a World Champion.
June 29, 2024
Indian men’s cricket team won the T20 World Cup 2024, putting an end to their decade-long ICC trophy draught.
July 30, 2024
Manu Bhaker created history by winning second bronze medal in shooting at Paris Olympics 2024. She teamed up with Sarabjot Singh to win bronze in 10m Air Pistol mixed team event. In the same edition, she had earlier won a bronze in the women’s 10m air pistol.