INDIA- An element of surprise

No one expected India to win any prizes in any international competition but Norman Pritchard won us not one but two Olympic medals in athletics. Yes, he later chose to compete for Great Britain but at the time of the competition in May, 1900, he was representing British ruled India at the Olympics. As a matter of fact, he was the only athlete from India! Later in 1928, at Amsterdam, no one expected Indian Hockey team to win a gold but they did and kept winning medals in hockey for the next 9 editions of the Olympics, 7 gold, 1 silver and 2 bronze medals. Similarly, Indians were considered weak until Khashaba Dadasaheb Jadhav showed the world that Indians were strong indeed with a bronze in 1952 Helsinki Olympics.

Similarly India were not expected to win a Cricket match if not a Cricket World cup way back in 1951-52 in Chennai against the team that represented a land which gave us the gentleman's game, England.

India even went on to the 1950 FIFA world cup. Unfortunately, a just then independent country could not buy the players the air tickets to fly to Brazil, even though FIFA had agreed to bear most of the costs.

source : www.clipartof.com

Similarly, in the diplomatic world, many did not have confidence about India ruled by Indians. But today, our country has outshone many countries in various fields. Not many of us know that the railway coaches, that are operating in Nigeria and a few more countries are actually built in India! India has been one of the world's leaders in space technology. We are more intelligent than the rest of the world. Unfortunately, we do not realize that and we allow ourselves to be exploited by foreign nations. We also have allowed ourselves to become corrupt.

But with the rise of a young and resurgent Indian citizen, with a dream of a corruption-free nation that has achieved the status of super power in mind, one can surely expect a few more elements of surprises in fields other than sports from the second-most populous nation in the world.