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By:

Bhalchandra Chorghade

11 August 2025 at 1:54:18 pm

Applause for Cricket, Silence for Badminton

Mumbai: When Lakshya Sen walked off the court after the final of the All England Badminton Championships, he carried with him the disappointment of another near miss. The Indian shuttler went down in straight games to Lin Chun-Yi, who created history by becoming the first player from Chinese Taipei to lift the prestigious title. But the story of Lakshya Sen’s defeat is not merely about badminton final. It is also about the contrasting way India celebrates its sporting heroes. Had the same...

Applause for Cricket, Silence for Badminton

Mumbai: When Lakshya Sen walked off the court after the final of the All England Badminton Championships, he carried with him the disappointment of another near miss. The Indian shuttler went down in straight games to Lin Chun-Yi, who created history by becoming the first player from Chinese Taipei to lift the prestigious title. But the story of Lakshya Sen’s defeat is not merely about badminton final. It is also about the contrasting way India celebrates its sporting heroes. Had the same narrative unfolded on a cricket field, the reaction would have been dramatically different. In cricket, even defeat often becomes a story of heroism. A hard-fought loss by the Indian team can dominate television debates, fill newspaper columns and trend across social media for days. A player who narrowly misses a milestone is still hailed for his fighting spirit. The nation rallies around its cricketers not only in victory but also in defeat. The narrative quickly shifts from the result to the effort -- the resilience shown, the fight put up, the promise of future triumph. This emotional investment is one of the reasons cricket enjoys unparalleled popularity in India. It has built a culture where players become household names and their performances, good or bad, become part of the national conversation. Badminton Fights Contrast that with what happens in sports like badminton. Reaching the final of the All England Championships is a monumental achievement. The tournament is widely considered badminton’s equivalent of Wimbledon in prestige and tradition. Only the very best players manage to reach its final stages, and doing it twice speaks volumes about Lakshya Sen’s ability and consistency. Yet the reaction in India remained largely subdued. There were congratulatory posts, some headlines acknowledging the effort and brief discussions among badminton enthusiasts. But the level of national engagement never quite matched the magnitude of the achievement. In a cricketing context, reaching such a stage would have triggered days of celebration and analysis. In badminton, it often becomes just another sports update. Long Wait India’s wait for an All England champion continues. The last Indian to win the title was Pullela Gopichand in 2001. Before him, Prakash Padukone had scripted history in 1980. These victories remain among the most significant milestones in Indian badminton. And yet, unlike cricketing triumphs that are frequently revisited and celebrated, such achievements rarely stay in the mainstream sporting conversation for long. Lakshya Sen’s journey to the final should ideally have been viewed as a continuation of that legacy, a reminder that India still possesses the talent to challenge the world’s best in badminton. Instead, it risks fading quickly from public memory. Visibility Gap The difference ultimately comes down to visibility and cultural investment. Cricket in India is not merely a sport; it is an ecosystem built over decades through media attention, sponsorship, and mass emotional attachment. Individual sports, on the other hand, often rely on momentary bursts of recognition, usually during Olympic years or when a medal is won. But consistent performers like Lakshya Sen rarely receive the sustained spotlight that their achievements deserve. This disparity can also influence the next generation. Young athletes are naturally drawn to sports where success brings recognition, financial stability and national fame. When one sport monopolises the spotlight, others struggle to build similar appeal. Beyond Result Lakshya Sen may have finished runner-up again, but his performance at the All England Championship is a reminder that India continues to produce world-class athletes in disciplines beyond cricket. The real issue is not that cricket receives immense attention -- it deserves the admiration it gets. The concern is that athletes from other sports often do not receive comparable appreciation for achievements that are equally significant in their own arenas. If India aspires to become a truly global sporting nation, its applause must grow broader. Sporting pride cannot remain confined to one field. Because somewhere on a badminton court, an athlete like Lakshya Sen is fighting just as hard for the country’s colours as any cricketer on a packed stadium pitch. The only difference is how loudly the nation chooses to cheer.

Drowned Hills, Shaky Ground

A string of cloudbursts and landslides has battered Himachal Pradesh, but the true disaster is man-made.

Himachal Pradesh
Himachal Pradesh

Each year, the monsoon descends on Himachal Pradesh with rhythmic violence. This year, the deluge has been especially brutal, with at least 75 people dead till now, more than 35 missing and over 500 roads blocked under debris and mud. Flash floods have swept away bridges, homes and livestock, with the government pegging damages at Rs. 700 crore ($84 million) and rising. As the state reels, a difficult question hangs in the mist: was this catastrophe wrought solely by nature or did human negligence and political complacency make it worse?


The Congress-led state government, under Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, has made all the right noises: promises of compensation, deployment of emergency forces and coordination with the Centre. But even as Sukhu strikes the right tone in press briefings, his administration’s handling of the state’s fragile mountain ecology has left much to be desired. In its first full year in power, the Congress dispensation had ample warning from last year’s floods which killed over 550 people, but did little to invest in disaster resilience. The result is a state once again caught scrambling with waterlogged roads, darkened towns and isolated villages.


Mandi district, the worst-hit region, has become the face of this year’s crisis. It has recorded more than a dozen deaths, with entire villages in areas like Thunag, Bagsayed, Karsog and Dharampur cut off. While party rivalries and political mudslinging simmer in the background, the people of Mandi and indeed the rest of Himachal are demanding more than political point-scoring. They desperately seek relief, demand accountability and need reconstruction.


The Sukhu government has announced a Rs. 5,000 payout per family for temporary accommodation and is overseeing relief operations with the help of the National Disaster Response Force. The central government, too, has weighed in, with Home Minister Amit Shah promising all possible assistance. But promises ring hollow when villagers are still digging out the rubble with bare hands. Across the state, over 500 electricity transformers have failed, 281 water schemes are non-functional, and a red alert for more rain remains in place. The looming shortage of water, power, and food in remote areas is now a humanitarian crisis in the making.


Himachal Pradesh has always been vulnerable to rain-induced calamities, but its increasing fragility owes more to human intervention than Himalayan topography. The hills are being choked by reckless construction as evinced by the building of multi-storey hotels on unstable slopes, highways cut into young mountains and hydroelectric projects built without adequate environmental safeguards. Forests that once absorbed rainwater have been cleared. Rivers have been narrowed or diverted. Little wonder that the monsoon, once a season of renewal, now unleashes chaos.


The state’s political class, regardless of party, has long prioritised short-term gains over long-term resilience. Hydropower remains a favourite talking point, as does road connectivity. But when asked about enforcing construction codes, undertaking geotechnical assessments, or retreating from ecologically fragile zones, governments tend to go mum. Even the lessons of the devastating 2023 monsoon have barely altered the approach: Himachal continues to treat the rains not as a structural challenge, but as an episodic inconvenience.


If there is a silver lining, it is that public awareness of ecological mismanagement is growing. There is mounting pressure on the government to overhaul its disaster preparedness, invest in early-warning systems, and impose strict regulations on slope construction. Communities are demanding not just compensation, but accountability.


This year’s devastation should be the final alarm. Himachal Pradesh, like neighbouring Uttarakhand, must adopt a policy of retreat from ecologically sensitive zones. Construction codes must be made stricter and strictly enforced by the Sukhu-led government. Above all, planning must shift from reactive relief to preventive resilience. Early warning systems, better drainage infrastructure and community-level disaster preparedness can mitigate some of the inevitable effects of climate volatility. The Himalayas will always be home to risk. But it is policy, not precipitation, that determines whether risk becomes tragedy.

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