India’s sole athlete on the Beijing Olympics hails from Kashmir. Arif Khan took up winter sports activities after being inspired by his father, who owns a ski store and was taught the whole lot there may be in regards to the Himalayas by Colonel Narendra Kumar – one of many first Indians to scale the Siachen Glacier and a staff member of Operation Meghdoot to grab management of the Siachen Glacier in 1984.
‘If you’re an athlete, this ought to be your dream,’ stated Gulmarg’s Arif in an Instagram publish whereas standing in entrance of the Olympic rings on the Yanqing National Alpine Ski Centre, 90 kms northwest of Beijing. He is India’s lone entrant to the 2022 Winter Olympics and made historical past when he grew to become the primary Indian man to qualify for 2 occasions – slalom and big slalom – in a single Winter Olympics.
Qualifying for his first Olympics happened on the slopes of Dubai’s synthetic snow. It was additional adopted by a quota spot in males’s big slalom, earned in Kolasin, Montenegro.
This dream of Arif’s was set in movement approach earlier than he was even born. In the Eighties, Colonel Kumar and his household arrange Mercury Himalayan Explorations. For 36 years, Yasin Khan labored with India’s premier mountaineering household, establishing a tourism business in Gulmarg. He was a part of the enterprise when Colonel Kumar’s daughter Shailaja participated within the 1988 Calgary Winter Olympics for India within the slalom occasion.
Six years after he noticed his employer’s daughter grow to be the primary Indian lady to take part within the Winter Olympics, Yasin arrange his personal store in Gulmarg, throughout a slope that obtained contemporary snowfall. And then his son prompted him to dream.
“I still remember the day I entered Gulmarg for the first time. There was so much snow when we were walking through those galis towards my father’s ski shop. The next day he stood beside me and helped me put on the boots, tighten the bindings and get onto the skis,” remembers Arif.
It took the senior Khan 4 days to be satisfied that he may need simply seen one other Olympian-in-the-making. It wasn’t simply the fish-to-water nature of his son’s first snow expertise, however the lack of concern he confirmed whereas snowboarding downhill. It was virtually as if he was born to do that.
“Darpok nahi tha (he wasn’t scared),” his father sums up.
That assertion would ring true as a younger Arif started to journey outdoors India at the same time as he hit teenage years. The household’s enterprise – Kashmir Alpine Ski Shop at Highlands Park – made sufficient to dedicate a significant chunk of earnings to ship him for competitions internationally. Turkey, Spain, Iran – wherever there was an icy slope, a younger Kashmiri teenager, on their lonesome in that a part of the world, can be current.
But cash quickly grew to become a consider Arif’s improvement. He was properly conscious of pioneers like Shiva Kesavan, who was at all times in fund-raising mode, with no actual authorities help for the Winter Olympians. Years of being within the wilderness, and slowly clawing his approach into the rivalry in a sport that hardly made an impression on the remainder of the nation, would have made somebody much less decided hand over. But the household enterprise saved Arif afloat. Friends and well-wishers saved chipping in through the years.
Controversy & setback
It wasn’t till 2017 that Arif had his first actual sniff of a hope of creating it to the Olympics. The Pyeongchang Games had been lastly meant to be his debut on the most important stage. But the lean enterprise years of 2016-18 had hit the household arduous. Coupled with that, an issue erupted within the Indian winter sports activities group when information leaked that Arif had visited Pakistan.
“He was the South Asian champion at the time. Invites for the event in Pakistan had been sent to the best skiers in the world. The ski federation president gave him permission to go as well. He was called an anti-Indian,” stated Arif’s father.
Arif was supposed to participate in 5 totally different occasions in an try to qualify shortly after. But the turbulent interval had taken its toll and he failed in his makes an attempt to enter his first Olympics. “I missed out on the funding for the Olympics by Rs 1.5 lakh,” chuckled the previous Army School alumni over telephone when recalling the setback.
With PyeongChang within the rear-view mirror, Arif determined to double up on his coaching in addition to his funding sources. But a few years later, Covid struck. Business within the Kashmir Valley, already bottlenecked, was all of the sudden a trickle.
“Tourism is always dependent on the situation in Kashmir. If there is a good situation, tourism is good. A huge number of people come in for winter sport activities. But if the situation in the valley is different, hardly anyone comes,” Arif advised The Indian Express. But then the primary wave subsided and Indians began to flock in report numbers to Gulmarg. Difficulty in going overseas was what did the trick, stated Arif.
“Covid actually brought business back to us because there was nowhere else to go. Europe was closed for Indian tourists and the only destination that was open was Kashmir. Almost 50 percent more people came during this period for tourism. It was one of the best years we have ever had in Kashmir.”
The sudden rise in enterprise, coupled with Arif having to sit down out the 2020 season due to the virus, caused a bump in his pockets in contrast to earlier years. A European coaching stint adopted after which an opportunity encounter in Gulmarg turned the whole lot on its head.
A member of the Jindal household was snowboarding in Gulmarg and a profitable assembly between father, son and company funding happened. Today, 40 p.c of Arif’s coaching bills are taken care of by JSW. The relaxation come from his inclusion in Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS) in addition to the Jammu and Kashmir authorities’s coffers.
“We tried to make the story of someone from India being a part of the Winter Olympics as the main attraction,” stated Arif. He succeeded in doing so, regardless that it took over 120 worldwide occasions, disappointments galore – even a marriage postponement. Early morning on Sunday, that success will get its second within the snow.
#ArifKhan, the one athlete representing India at #Beijing2022, carries the tricolor excessive on the opening ceremony.
The 31-year-old Alpine skier will compete within the Slalom and Giant Slalom occasions scheduled to happen on February 13 and 16 pic.twitter.com/dZKEOZO0Lg
— Express Sports (@IExpressSports) February 4, 2022
Watch Arif Khan’s Giant Slalom occasion on February 13, Sunday on Olympics.com (Run 1 – 7:45 AM IST, Run 2 – 11:15 AM IST)
