India at the 2024 Summer Olympics

India competed at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, France, held from 26 July to 11 August 2024. The country made its debut at the 1900 Summer Olympics. Indian athletes have appeared at every edition of the Summer Olympic Games since 1920 and the Paris Games edition marked India's 26th appearance at the Summer Olympics.

The Indian contingent consisted of 110 athletes who competed in 16 sports. P.V. Sindhu and Sharath Kamal were the flag-bearers for the opening ceremony. Manu Bhaker and P. R. Sreejesh carried the Indian flag during the closing ceremony.

India won six medals including a silver and five bronze to be ranked 71st amongst the 206 NOCs that participated in the Olympics. This was India's third-best medal haul after the 2020 and 2012 respectively. Manu Bhaker won two bronze medals in shooting and became the first Indian to win two medals in a single Olympics since India gained independence. Neeraj Chopra, who won a silver medal in the men's javelin throw event, became the first Indian individual medalist to win a gold and silver at the Olympics. Wrestler Aman Sehrawat, who won a bronze medal became the youngest ever Indian medal winner in the Olympics.

Background

The Indian Olympic Association was recognized by the International Olympic Committee in 1927. However, by this time, the nation had already made its first Summer Olympics debut at the 1900 Olympics in Paris and had competed in Olympic Games of 1920 and 1924. Indian athletes have appeared at every edition of the Summer Olympic Games since 1920 and this edition of the Games marked the nation's 26th appearance at the Summer Olympics.

The Indian contingent for this year's games consisted of 117 athletes: 110 competitors and 7 alternate, in addition to 118 support staff and 22 officials. Gagan Narang was appointed as the Chef de mission aka head of mission while Shiva Keshavan was chosen as his deputy.

P.V. Sindhu and Sharath Kamal were the flag-bearers for the opening ceremony of Paris 2024. Shooter Manu Bhaker, who won two medals at the edition, and the field hockey team's goalkeeper P. R. Sreejesh were the flag bearers for the closing ceremony.

Medals summary

India won six medals in total including one silver and five bronze, three of which come from shooting. This was India's joint second highest total medal haul after the previous Games. Manu Bhaker won the first medal for India in the women's 10 m air pistol event. She won a bronze medal and became the first woman shooter to win an Olympic medal for India. In the mixed 10 m air pistol team event, she partnered with Sarabjot Singh to win another bronze medal, thus becoming the first Indian since independence to win two medals in a single Olympics. Swapnil Kusale then won another bronze medal in the men's 50 m rifle three positions event. This became India's seventh shooting medal across the Olympic Games.

The men's field hockey team won the bronze medal in the men's event after they defeated Spain in the match for the third place. This was the country's second consecutive bronze in men's hockey at the Olympics. Neeraj Chopra then won a silver medal in the men's javelin throw event. With his gold medal in the 2020 Olympics, he became the fifth individual multiple medalist for India and first to win a gold and silver combination. Aman Sehrawat won a bronze medal for India in the men's freestyle 57kg wrestling event. The 21-year-old became the youngest Indian to win an Olympic medal.

Medalists

Competitors

There were 110 athletes who took part in the medal events across 16 sports.

Archery

As per the qualification system drawn up by the World Archery Federation, each National Olympic Committee (NOC) was permitted to enter a maximum of six competitors, three per gender. NOCs that qualify teams for a particular gender are able to send a three-member team to the team event and also have each member compete in the individual event with the remaining spots filled by individual qualification tournaments. The qualification for the team event was determined by various qualification tournaments and world archery rankings. The Indian men's and women's team qualified for the men's and women's team events respectively as one of the two best ranked teams that had not already qualified in the respective categories.

Dhiraj Bommadevara had secured a place in the men's individual event at the Asian qualifiers in Bangkok and Bhajan Kaur had obtained a quota place for the women's individual event at the World qualifiers held at Antalya. As India qualified for both the team events, India was eligible to send six archers and the individual places were re-allocated to other NOCs. The Indian archery squad for the Games consisted of Bommadevara, Pravin Jadhav, and Tarundeep Rai in the men's team and Kaur, Deepika Kumari, and Ankita Bhakat in the women's team with Rai and Kumari participating in their fourth Olympic Games.

The ranking rounds for the archery events were held at the Les Invalides on 25 July. In the men's individual ranking rounds, Bommadevara was the highest placed Indian in fourth place with 681 points followed by Rai in 14th and Jadhav in 39th. Their combined score resulted in a third seeding for the team event and a direct entry to the quarterfinals. Bhakat was the highest ranked Indian in the women's individual event after she qualified in 11th with 666 points followed by Kaur in 22nd and Kumari in 23rd. Their combined score resulted in a fourth seeding for the team event. Bommadevara and Bhakat combined to be ranked at the fifth spot in the qualification for the mixed team event.

Men

In the men's team event, the third seeded Indian team lost to the lower seeded Turkey in the quarterfinals. The Indian team lost the first two sets before they won a closely contested third set by a score of 55–54. But the Turkish team won the fourth set easily to win the match and send India out of the competition. In the men's individual events, Jadhav and Rai did not progress beyond the round of 32 after they lost their initial bouts. Bommadevara won his first round match before he lost in the round of 16 to Eric Peters of Canada in a closely contested match, which ended in the Indian losing in a single arrow shoot-off.

Women

In the women's team event, the higher seeded Indian team lost to 12th seeded Netherlands in the quarterfinals by a score of 0–6 after losing the first three sets. In the women's individual event, Bhakat was eliminated in the first round by Wioleta Myszor of Poland. Kaur won her first round match against Indonesia's Syifa Kamal before she beat the Polish archer Myszor in the next round by a score of 6–0. In the round of 32, she faced off against Diananda Choirunisa of Indonesia. Both of them traded alternate sets in a match that ended in a tie and the Indonesian prevailed in the final shoot-off for the match.

Kumari won her first two rounds to progress through to the round of 16. In the first round, she trailed the Estonian archer Reena Pärnat 3–5 before the scores were leveled. In the shoot-off, the Indian won to progress to the next round, where she defeated Quinty Roeffen of Netherlands easily by a score of 6–2. In the next round, she raced to 5–1 lead before prevailing against German Michelle Kroppen in a close contest by a score of 6–4. In the quarterfinals, she lost another close match against reigning Olympic silver medalist Nam Su-hyeon of South Korea. Both the competitors traded the first four sets alternatively before the Korean took the decisive fifth set that ended Kumari's participation.

Mixed

In the mixed team event, Bommadevara and Bhakat progressed to the quarterfinals with an easy victory over Indonesia and beat Spain in the next round. In the semifinals, they lost to the top ranked pair of Lim Si-hyeon and Kim Woo-jin by a 2–6 score line. In the bronze medal match, they lost by a similar score to third seeded Casey Kaufhold and Brady Ellison to miss out on a medal.

Legend: W = Win; L = Loss

Athletics

As per the governing body World Athletics (WA), a NOC was allowed to enter up to three qualified athletes in each individual event and one qualified relay team if the Olympic Qualifying Standards (OQS) had been met during the qualifying period at the events approved by WA. The remaining places are allocated based on the World Athletics Rankings which were derived from the average of the best five results for an athlete over the designated qualifying period, weighted by the importance of the meet. The qualification window for the marathon races was from 1 November 2022 to 30 April 2024; for the 10,000 metres, combined events (heptathlon and decathlon), racewalks, and relays from 31 December 2022 to 30 June 2024; and for the remaining events on the program from 1 July 2023 to 30 June 2024. Each NOC was allowed five athletes for the relay events as provided by the qualification system.

India achieved six quotas for track events, five for road events, ten for field events apart from two relay teams. Murali Sreeshankar, who had secured a quota for the Men's Long Jump after recording a jump of 8.37m at the 2023 Asian Athletics Championships in Bangkok, withdrew from the games due to an injury. Abha Khatua qualified for the women's shot put event but was left out of the final contingent for unknown reasons. The final Indian contingent for the Games consisted of 28 athletes including 23 track and field athletes competing in 16 disciplines.