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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.

The Saffron Warriors

Updated: Oct 22, 2024

Saffron Warriors

When Uddhav Thackeray took oath as the 18th chief minister of Maharashtra on November 28, 2019, he proclaimed that he had fulfilled his late father’s wish to have a ‘Shiv Sainik’ seated in the highest executive office in the Government of Maharashtra. It surprised many to see members of the Thackeray family taking up a constitutional post as Uddhav’s son, Aditya, followed him into the council of ministers. For over four decades since he founded the Shiv Sena as a political party, Bal Thackeray never aimed to hold any office. He had proudly claimed he that was the “remote control” that controlled the actions of the chief minister when the Shiv Sena and BJP had formed the government between 1995 and 1999. The Thackeray dynasty, until 2019, was seen as the force behind the scenes, one that had full authority but no answerability.


Bal Thackeray, one among the eight children of writer and social reformer Prabhodhankar or Keshav Thackeray, founded the Shiv Sena on June 19, 1966. He had started his career as a cartoonist in the Free Press Journal and later went on to publish Marmik, a weekly in Marathi. A cartoonist par excellence and journalist, Thackeray used his weekly to comment on social and political issues and started his career in public life by leading a movement against migrants and fighting for the rights of the sons-of-the-soil. Therein lay the birth of the Shiv Sena, a party that later went on to scale great heights and reach the chambers of power in the Centre and in the state.


Thackeray anointed Uddhav as his heir in January 2003 at the party’s conclave. He took over as the ‘pakshapramukh’ and after Raj’s departure from the party, Sena workers rallied around Uddhav. In 2010, Thackeray launched his grandson Aaditya at a grand party event and handed over the reins of the Yuva Sena or the youth wing of the party to him.


 The father-son duo kept their flock together in elections even after the death of the senior Thackeray in 2012, winning the cash-rich Mumbai municipal corporation and state elections with the BJP. In 2019, in a surprise turn of events, Uddhav was named Chief Minister of Maharashtra as part of a post-poll alliance with the Congress and Nationalist Congress Party.


 His party split when senior leader Eknath Shinde walked away with legislators in 2022.

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