A total of 118 athletes from India have qualified for 16 sports for the Paris Olympics. This includes 48 female athletes. Manu Bhaker, PV Sindhu, Vinesh Phogat, Nikhat Zareen and Lovlina Borgohain, these are some big names from whom India is expecting medals. Today, the way Indian female athletes have made the country proud across the world and are claiming medals in different sports of the Olympics, it was not so easy till some time ago. In the year 2000, the door of the Olympics opened for these female athletes for the first time in Sydney. This year Karnam Malleswari wrote a new history by winning a bronze medal in weightlifting. She became the first female athlete to win a medal in the Olympics. Today we will tell you the story of this Olympics.

How did Karnam Malleswari become an inspiration?

In the last decade, Indian women players have emerged as the pride of the country in the Olympic Games. In the last 3 editions of the Olympics, India has won a total of 15 medals, out of which 7 times women athletes have done wonders. In the London Olympics 2012, Saina Nehwal gave India a taste of medal in badminton for the first time. Mary Kom brought pride to the country by winning a bronze medal in boxing. Four years later, i.e. in the Rio Olympics, India got two medals and both these feats were achieved by women.

Karnam Malleswari is the first Indian woman to win an Olympic medal.

While PV Sindhu won silver in badminton, Sakshi Malik won bronze medal in wrestling. In Tokyo Olympics 2020, women athletes created a new record. They won 3 out of 7 medals for the country, which was the best performance ever for women. All this was possible due to Karnam Malleswari's medal in Sydney Olympics 2000. So many girls took inspiration from her victory and brought glory to the country in the Olympics. In a recent interview to The Hindu, she expressed happiness that she could become an inspiration to many athletes because of that medal.

Karnam Malleswari - 'The Iron Lady'

Sydney Olympics 2000 was not very special in terms of medals. The country got only one medal, but only one medal was enough to create history. In this edition, a total of 65 athletes from India qualified for 13 sports. However, out of these, only Karnam Malleswari was successful. When all the other athletes failed, she took the responsibility of winning medals for India. Due to this historic medal won in weightlifting, she became famous in India as 'The Iron Lady'. The then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee congratulated her for this medal and called her 'Bharat ki Beti'. In Sydney, where most of the athletes were eliminated in the initial rounds, Karnam Malleswari was successful in winning the medal.

How did this miracle happen in Sydney?

Women's weightlifting category was added for the first time during Sydney Olympics. Although everyone's eyes were on Karnam, she was not considered a contender for victory. The big reason behind this was that she had not won the World Championship since 1996. Apart from this, she had shifted herself to the 69 Kg category, under which she had never participated in any major tournament on the world stage. Karnam proved everyone wrong and became the first Indian woman to win an Olympic medal.

She defeated Hungary's Erzsebet Marcus and China's Lin Wening. In the final, all three lifted a weight of 110 Kg in the snatch category. After this, during the clean and jerk category, Wening took the lead by lifting 132.5 Kg in the first attempt, while Karnam and Marcus were able to lift 125 Kg. In the second attempt, Wening could not lift this weight. Marcus tied with 132.5 Kg and Karnam raised hopes by lifting 130 Kg.

Karnam missed gold in the final

In the final, the competition for the gold medal had become exciting. Both of Karnam's opponents were leading by lifting a total weight of 242.5 kg, while she was trailing by 2.5 kg. Now she had to lift at least 132.5 kg to get silver and 135 kg for gold. She had achieved success by lifting 130 kg and had to increase the weight by only 2.5 kg. However, her coach advised her to increase the weight by 7.5 kg and try for 137.5 kg, so that she could easily come first.

Karnam had done this in practice, so she followed her coach's advice, but could not succeed in it. She hurried to lift the weight and it got stuck on her knees, causing her to fall. Although she missed out on winning the gold, she won the bronze and created a new history for women.

Mother's important contribution

Karnam Malleswari belongs to a family which has a long association with sports. Her father Karnam Manohar was a football player. Her 4 sisters were into weightlifting. However, her mother Shyamala has played an important role in this historic journey of Karnam Malleswari. When Karnam Malleswari was 12 years old, her coach declared her unfit for weightlifting due to her physical weakness. After this, her mother encouraged her for this sport and she started training under the supervision of coach Neelam Shetty Appanna in Andhra Pradesh.

1990 was the turning point

The year 1990 proved to be a turning point for Malleswari. Her sister was selected for the national camp. She also went there as a visitor. Malleswari was observing every process in this camp carefully. This thing drew the attention of Olympic and world champion Leonid Taranenko and he took her trial. He was very impressed by this and called Malleswari for training at the Sports Institute of Bangalore. After this, she went to the National Camp of Sports Authority of India in Delhi. This year she broke 9 national records at the junior level.

became world champion twice

Before winning the medal in Sydney Olympics, Karnam Malleswari had become world champion twice. In 1993, she participated in the World Championship for the first time, but she had to be content with bronze. The very next year in 1994, she won the gold medal and became world champion. This year she also won the silver medal in the Asian Games. After this, she defended the title of world champion in 1995, although in 1996 she had to be content with bronze medal again in this competition. Malleswari won the silver medal in the Asian Games in 1998 and two years later won the historic bronze medal in Sydney.

Karnam Malleswari's Awards

For Karnam Malleswari's invaluable contribution to weightlifting, she was awarded the Arjuna Award in 1994. In 1999, the Government of India first awarded her the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna and then the Padma Shri.