Calling in the new year with renewed vigour!!

As we enter the new decade of the new millennium, it is time to take stock of the year gone by, which has had it's share of hits and misses, highs and lows, peace and turbulence, heroes and villains. In large part, though, it was very much a year of revival for India, with some really significant achievements in the sporting front, and buoyed by the fading out of recession, India has a lot more to look forward to in 2010.

The highest point for any sports lover worth his salt in 2009, would be the crowning of India as the No.1 test team in the world, coming as it did after a total annihilation of the Sri Lankans at home, by a very comfortable margin. M S Dhoni and his boys managed to achieve what was beyond the reach of many talented captains in the past, taking India to the summit of cricketing excellence for the first time in over 50 years that India has been playing the gentleman's game. Totally outplaying the Lankans by an innings in both the second and third tests, India not only sealed the series at home, but also managed to give one of the game's longest serving ambassadors, batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar a moment to be extremely proud of, the one moment he has been waiting for in his illustrious 20-year career, the one achievement that was missing from his stellar career. The scaling of the summit in Tests put aside the disappointments of the performances in both the Twenty-20 World Cup and the Champions Trophy earlier in the year, where India failed to get beyond the league stages.



Cricket was not the only sport in which India made big strides. Young Saina Nehwal performed admirably in the year 2009 as well, raising the standards of Indian badminton with her exceptional performances through the year. With her victory in the Indonesian Open Super Series in July, she reached a career-high world ranking of 6, boasting of some really creditable wins over higher-ranked opponents in the process, as well. At 19, she still has plenty of good years left in the circuit, and, as the saying goes, her best is yet to come. With an accomplished mentor like former All England Open Champion Gopi Chand as coach, the talented youngster is capable of notching many more championship victories in the coming year.



Boxing is another sport where India has been making creditable progress. 24 year-old pugilist from Haryana, Vijender Singh ended 2009 on a high, clinching the number one ranking in the middleweight division, and another bronze-medal winning effort in the World Amateur Boxing Championships in Milan, to add to his bronze in the 2008 Beijing Olympics. With his stunning achievements in the last few years, Vijender has brought boxing back into the limelight in a nation obsessed with cricket, for the most part.

Pankaj Advani brought us laurels in billiards, winning the World Billiards Championship for the first time in his career, beating nine-time world champion Mike Russell to win the title, the one title that had eluded him so far. With a host of world snooker titles already under his belt, perseverance has paid the 24 year-old handsomely in billiards.



With the UPA front, led by the Congress, coming back to power in the centre, there have been significant steps taken to curb the ever-growing menace of terrorism(though there still is a long way to go on that front), with there being no further attacks in Mumbai, victim of the infamous terrorist strikes at the Taj and Oberoi hotels last year, though Bengal has still been reeling under constant Maoist attacks in the past year. The Home Minister, Mr. P. Chidambaram, has been doing his bit in sprucing up the otherwise laggard intelligence agencies, making an attempt to bring in more hi-tech measures for protection, and there is a definite likelihood of there being far lesser terrorist attacks in the coming years, thanks to the improvements being made as far as intelligence and preparation to avoid major attacks in future go.

All in all, there is far more to look forward to, in 2010, than there has been in the past, and plenty of reasons to keep an optimistic outlook towards the future of India, on the whole. Let us welcome the new decade of the new millennium on a high, and be witness to many more groundbreaking achievements as the years roll by.