Aparna Banerji

Tribune News Service

Mithapur, August 11

Creating history after four decades, the Olympic bronze-winning trio of the Indian hockey team — captain Manpreet Singh, Mandeep Singh and Varun Kumar — received a hero’s welcome at Mithapur village in Jalandhar today.

Non-stop applause, whistles, cheers, shouts of joy and the beats of the dhol and chants of ‘Jo Bole So Nihal, Sat Sri Akal’ created an electrifying atmosphere as the trio reached their native village. At the very outset, the village was decked up to welcome them. Huge posters of the players and the team dotted the village entrance.

The players’ homes had also been lit up with lights. At Manpreet’s home, the entrance was lit with decorative lanterns, lights and the gate was decked up with flowers.

The trio arrived in a flower-bedecked open jeep like heroes at Gurdwara Singh Sabha where their relatives were eagerly waiting for them with garlands. It took hours for the players’ caravan to navigate through the markets. Shopkeepers stopped their cavalcade, climbing up their vehicles to catch a glimpse, click a selfie or offer them sweets. At Mithapur, the three players arrived along with their parents and Jalandhar Cantt MLA Pargat Singh who had gone to Amritsar to receive them.

At the village, Manpreet’s 80 year-old maternal grandmother Gyan Kaur and Mandeep’s 70-year-old uncle Surinder Pal Singh Ghugga, aunts Jaswinder Kaur and Paramjit Kaur queued up to receive them. While the Indian hockey team has won a medal at the Olympics after 41 years, for Mithapur, it was a 48-year-long wait for a medal-winning Olympian from the village. It was in 1972 that the village’s Kulwant Singh was part of the bronze-winning squad. The trio paid obeisance at the gurdwara and reached the Shaheed Darshan Singh Kaypee Stadium where students and coaches of the Mithapur Hockey Club accorded them a grand welcome.