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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.

Persian Paradox

More sanctions, secret talks and a raging nuclear chess game only prove why diplomacy with Iran is harder than ever.

The United States is once again tightening the screws on Iran. On Tuesday, it sanctioned three Iranian nationals and a state-linked entity over their ties to Tehran’s shadowy Organisation of Defensive Innovation and Research (SPND), which Washington sees as the modern-day incarnation of the country’s pre-2004 nuclear weapons programme, the Amad Project. This move follows a fresh round of indirect nuclear negotiations in Oman and another cascade of economic measures aimed at strangling Iran’s oil-based revenue networks.


The timing of these sanctions is telling. The fourth round of nu but progress remains elusive. Iran’s nuclear programme continues to gallop ahead. According to U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the Islamic Republic is the only non-nuclear weapons state enriching uranium up to 60 percent purity - a stone’s throw from weapons-grade levels. Dual-use research into delivery systems remains active and procurement networks abroad help mask illicit acquisitions. Washington’s message bluntly says that these latest actions are meant to delay and degrade SPND’s nuclear research.


But diplomacy still simmers beneath the surface. Tehran even floated a proposal for a joint nuclear enrichment venture involving regional Arab states and American investments, an idea both bold and baffling, considering it would require cooperation between arch-rivals like Iran and Saudi Arabia, not to mention trust from a U.S. administration that has spent months reimposing Donald Trump’s ‘maximum pressure’ strategy.


That plan, leaked to the Iranian press, has sparked a domestic uproar. Even Farhikhtegan, a newspaper close to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), questioned whether the offer amounted to a service or treason. The idea of involving the United States in Iranian nuclear infrastructure is politically toxic in Tehran, where hardliners remain deeply suspicious of Western engagement after the collapse of the 2015 nuclear deal, or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), in 2018.


That deal was Barack Obama’s diplomatic high-water mark: a multilateral pact that capped Iranian enrichment levels in exchange for sanctions relief. But when Trump pulled out of the agreement in 2018 and reimposed sanctions, Iran resumed enrichment, albeit gradually at first. Since then, its nuclear capabilities have steadily grown. The Biden administration’s early efforts to revive the JCPOA collapsed amid mutual distrust.


The latest round of sanctions points to another escalation, this time aimed not just at Iran, but at its trading partner: China. On the same day, the U.S. Treasury blacklisted more than 20 companies linked to a sprawling oil network used to funnel billions of dollars to China. These firms, ranging from Singaporean inspection companies to Chinese shipping agents, allegedly disguised Iranian oil shipments, helping Tehran’s armed forces bankroll their drone and ballistic missile programmes and fund proxies like the Houthis in Yemen.


Such backdoor exports remain a vital lifeline for Iran’s regime. Yet, despite the sanctions, they continue largely unabated. If Washington wants to truly squeeze Tehran’s finances, analysts argue it would need to sanction major Chinese banks - something successive administrations have balked at, fearing the geopolitical fallout. However, using counterterrorism authorities to issue these new sanctions may be a subtle step toward that goal. It signals not only America’s determination to block nuclear proliferation, but also a triangulation strategy: pressuring China to rein in Iran.


Yet sanctions alone won’t yield a breakthrough. Iran’s new president, Masoud Pezeshkian, has publicly rejected calls to dismantle his country’s nuclear infrastructure. The Islamic Republic’s negotiating posture is tougher; its nuclear capacity, greater and its domestic politics, more tightly gripped by security hardliners.


The real paradox is that while both Washington and Tehran speak of peace, their actions lean toward conflict. Sanctions proliferate, enrichment accelerates and the region’s fault lines deepen. If a new accord is to emerge from the ashes of the JCPOA, it will require more than backchannel talks in Muscat. It will need imagination, trust and the political will to step back from the brink. Neither side, for now, seems ready to do so.

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