India's javelin star Neeraj Chopra secured a second successive Olympic medal, having won the silver at Paris 2024, with a throw of 89.45m. Meanwhile Pakistan's Arshad Nadeem's monstrous throw of 92.97m won the gold medal.
India's hopes of a lone gold medal at Paris Olympics ended abruptly on Thursday as javelin star Neeraj Chopra's best throw of 89.45m was only good for silver. Pakistan's Arshad Nadeem secured the title at Stade de France with a monstrous effort of 92.97m, the new Olympic Record. Nevertheless, Neeraj became only the fifth Indian to win multiple Olympic medals in individual events, having won the gold at Tokyo 2021.
Following this feat, Prime Minister Narendra Modi personally reached out to India's star javelin thrower, Neeraj Chopra, to congratulate him on his silver medal win at the Paris Olympics.
PM Modi spoke to Javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra and congratulated him on the Silver medal
He also enquired about his injury and lauded the sportsman spirit shown by his mother📷 pic.twitter.com/M5FiMyrZxw
Neeraj Chopra is excellence personified! Time and again he’s shown his brilliance. India is elated that he comes back with yet another Olympic success. Congratulations to him on winning the Silver. He will continue to motivate countless upcoming athletes to pursue their dreams… pic.twitter.com/XIjfeDDSeb
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi)Despite Neeraj Chopra securing a silver medal, Neeraj's mother Saroj Devi expressed immense pride and respect for Arshad Pakistan, who claimed his nation's first Olympics gold medal in 32 years. "We are happy with the silver. The one who got the gold (Arshad Nadeem) is also my child," Saroj Devi stated.
Neeraj Chopra's mother says “ I am happy with the silver, the guy who got gold ( Arshad Nadeem) is also my child, everyone goes there after doing a lot of hard work”
what grace from Neeraj Chopra's mother, something that people can learn a lot from ♥️
Most beautiful video on… pic.twitter.com/Uqz3LQZCv7
Neeraj qualified for the final at Stade de France with a stunning throw of 89.34m. It was the 26-year-old's second best throw ever. Although the Haryana-born athlete produced a better throw in the final, it was well short of Nadeem's record-breaking effort. Anderson Peters of Grenada won the bronze medal with a best effort of 88.54m.
Neeraj rose to lime light with a gold medal at the 2016 World U-20 Championships. He then went on to become Commonwealth Games and Asian Games champion, while also becoming the first Indian to secure gold medal at the World Athletics Championship and Olympics.