MC Mary Kom and Manpreet Singh have been named to jointly carry the Indian national flag at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Game.
The Indian Olympic Association has announced the flag-bearers for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. Ace boxer MC Mary Kom and men’s hockey team skipper Manpreet Singh will be the country’s flag bearers at the opening ceremony of Tokyo Olympics, the Indian Olympic Association announced on Monday.
The 2020 Olympics, deferred by a year due to the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, are scheduled to start in Tokyo on July 23.
One of India’s biggest medal hopes, wrestler Bajrang Punia will be the flag bearer at the closing ceremony on August 8. The IOA has communicated the decision to the Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee.
In a first, India will have two flag-bearers – a male and a female – at the Olympics’ opening ceremony to ensure “gender parity”. This was recently informed by IOA chief chief Narinder Batra. “It would be a huge huge moment for me given that it is my last Olympics. Who knows I might even get emotionally overwhelmed,” Mary Kokm told PTI after being named as one of the flag bearers.
“I am truly honoured to get this opportunity of leading the team out during the opening ceremony and I thank the sports ministry and IOA for naming me. It would be added motivation for me. I promise to do my best for a medal,” the six-time world champion added.
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The country’s lone individual Olympic gold-medallist Abhinav Bindra was the flag bearer at the opening ceremony of the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro.
Going by the tradition, PV Sindhu was presumed to be the front-runner to carry the flag at the Tokyo Games. In the Tokyo-bound contingent, she had been the only medallist from the Rio Games. The other medallist from Rio Sakshi Malik had failed to qualify for Tokyo. It had become a convention since the 2008 Beijing Olympics that a medallist from the previous Games was being bestowed the honour of carrying the tri-colour at the Games.
The Tokyo Games are scheduled to open on July 23 and over 100 athletes would be representing India at the show-piece, which was postponed by a year because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
At its executive board meeting last year, the International Olympic Committee had made provisions for flag-bearers from both genders at the opening ceremony. “…the IOC Executive Board also decided that there should be – for the first time ever – at least one female and one male athlete in every one of the 206 teams and the IOC Refugee Olympic Team participating at the Games of the Olympiad,” IOC chief Thomas Bach had said.
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