First Olympic flag-bearer of India
Bengal is not new to the Olympic gold
medal. In the 1920s and 1930s our hockey Olympians Richard Allen (3 golds) and Carlyle
Tapsell (2 golds) set the ball rolling with the gold nuggets round their necks
with the all-time legend Dhyan Chand’s India hockey team.
Yes, we do remember Dhyan Chand. But
what about the other great architects? Hope we have forgotten them! Why do we have so little time for our past legends?
Norman Pritchard, born of British
parents, was the first from Bengal and from India to go to the Olympics in 1900
an
We are going ahead of our story. The first person from Bengal of Indian parentage to go to the modern Olympic was an athlete by the name of Purna Chandra Banerjee. He was also the first sportsman from India to carry the Olympic flag at the march-past.The 7th of the modern Olympics. 1920, Antwerp, Belgium.
That was India’s first official entry after the formation of Indian Olympic Association in 1919. Tata’s and the House of Patiala were the principal sponsors of the India’s inaugural Olympic squad.
It was a long voyage as the tired limbs of 5
Indian pioneers to Olympic Games reached the destination via England. They had
little time to acclimatize. The heroic men were high-spirited athletes who
cared none for change of climate, food, environment in a foreign land, totally
at variance with India. They hardly found the time or the facilities on the ship deck for practice.
Apart from Purna Chandra Banerjee, the other
two athletes were Phadeppa Chaugule (10,000m & marathon) and Sadashiv Datar
(marathon). Two wrestlers formed the full squad: Kumar Navale (middle-weight)
and Dinkar Rao (Randhir?) Shinde (featherweight).
On track PC Banerjee’s blistering
speed gave him the 4th rank in one of the 100m heats. Unfortunately
it was not enough to qualify for the final. Without losing hope he also
participated in the 400m. Here again he had to be content with a 4th
rank in the heats.
In India he was the redoubtable champion in his events. He won his events with ease and could have stayed back to enjoy the adulation at home.
Dinkar Rao (Randhir?) Shinde was
unlucky to miss the bronze by a narrow margin as he came 4th in the
final standing. But who has the time and inclination to remember them? Apart
from cricket, no other sport in India has any idea of its own heritage! Only
bothered about official posts, media publicity and …
Purna Chandra Banerjee, a resident of
Calcutta, was a member of Mohun Bagan Athletic Club during his active years
between 1915 and 1925. He was popularly known as Pooeeya-da. The national
champion was a very popular man with his relaxed presence.
He had a nephew, whom we called
Prodosh-mama, a raconteur of unimaginable excesses! Prodosh-mama’s flights of
imagination nearly convinced us that Purna Chandra actually went on to win a
gold medal at the Antwerp Olympics! He shrugged,” But, Kaka, as you all know (!), was very careless and lost the gold medal
in some flood at Calcutta!”
Shades of what we have heard from one
of our hockey players of the 1970s regarding a bronze medal! Team medals were
given only to those players who represented the nation’s XI in at least one
match at the Olympic Games. Bengal and India's heroic Leslie Claudius happens to be the only Olympian to have actually lost
all his 3 gold and 1 silver medals way back in the 1980s.
Purna Chandra Banerjee or Pooeeya-da
remains India’s first-ever flag bearer at the Olympic Games. Of course, neither
India nor Bengal or Mohun Bagan bothers to remember him.
Who has the time to remember dead pioneers?
Top left: PURNA CHANDRA BANERJEE
2nd row ,extreme left: DINKAR RAO SHINDE
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