London Olympics beckons a resurgent India

LONDON: The Beijing Olympics are not yet over but people of Indian origin here are convinced that Indias medal tally will be much higher in London 2012 than that notched by Abhinav Bindra, Sushil Kumar and Vijender Kumar at Beijing.
 
The London-based steel baron, Lakshmi Mittal, has already committed funds to support the Indian contingent for the London event through his Mittal Champions Trust.
 
The six-member trust is headed by Mittal and includes his son Aditya, son-in-law Ashish Bhatia, tennis star Mahesh Bhupathi, cricketer Rahul Dravid and administrator Manisha Malhotra.
 
It funds specialised training and provides an overall support system to athletes.
 
Apart from the large Indian community in Britain, one Briton who will be quietly happy if India does much better at the London 2012 Olympics is none other than Sebastian Coe, the 12-time world record holder in Athletics.
 
He is the chairman of the London organising Committee of the Olympic Games (LOCOG).
 
Coes mother was of Indian origin, but he visited India for the first time to canvass Indias support just before London won the bid in Singapore in 2004 to host the 2012 Olympics.
 
In fact, according to Mihir Bose, BBCs sports editor, Coes connections with India stood Britain in good stead when he went around Commonwealth countries to canvas support for Londons bid. The other two contenders were Paris and Madrid.
 
Bose wrote: "During the bid Coe rediscovered his roots, which played a crucial part in London winning.
 
"Coe's mother was of Indian origin but Coe had never visited India. He was invited by India to run for them in the 1988 Seoul Olympics when Britain refused to choose him. But Coe declined.

"But during the London bid Coe visited his mother's country for the first time.
 
"Soon he had built up a successful coalition of the entire Commonwealth - and not just the old white one that had often in the past been the domain of previous British sports administrators.
 
"This coalition was crucial to London's success in Singapore".
 
Coe has a smaller budget for the 2012 event (9.3 billion pounds) than what Beijing spent (22.6 billion pounds).
 
Coe believes that the Beijing Olympics "marks a zenith in terms of grandeur and scale". This means that London 2012 will be different but Coe insists it will not be in any way inferior.
 
Bose wrote: "The word here is that London will do it its own way, with a touch of British funkiness.
 
"That British ability to surprise people by being different will make up for the fact that stadia will not be iconic. There will be nothing like the Bird's Nest in Stratford, where the venues will be smaller and the whole  thing much more functional than here in Beijing."
 
Coe won gold in the 1500m and silver in the 800m at both the Moscow 1980 and Los Angeles 1984 Olympics. He retired from competitive athletics in 1990 and became a Conservative MP.
 
In 2002 he was made a peer Lord Coe of Ranmore. He received a knighthood in the 2006 New Year's Honours List.