Who are India’s youngest and oldest medallists in Asian Games?

India finished this edition’s Asian Games with a whopping 107 medals, 30 higher than its previous best performance of 70 medals in 2018. Sportstar takes a look at the youngest and the oldest of these medallists.

Representative image: The track and field athletes were the most productive, bringing home 29 medals, including a historic one-two in men’s javelin event between Olympic gold-medallist Neeraj Chopra and Kishore Kumar Jena.  | Photo Credit: AP

India finished this edition’s Asian Games with a never-before-seen 107 medals, 30 higher than its previous best performance of 70 medals in 2018.

But the age difference between the youngest and the oldest medallist at the Asiad is event wider - 50!

The track and field athletes were the most productive, bringing home 29 medals, including a historic one-two in men’s javelin event between Olympic gold-medallist Neeraj Chopra and Kishore Kumar Jena. However, two others— Sanjana Bathula and Jaggy Shivdasani— added their names to India’s record books.

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Sanjana, teamed up with Karthika Jagadeeswaran, Heeral Sadhu and Aarathy Kasturi Raj clinched bronze in the women’s 3000m roller skating relay with a timing of 4:34.861, become India’s youngest Indian medallist.

Meanwhile, bridge player Shivdasani, who was born on February 16, 1958, became India’s oldest medallist at the Asiads. He was a part of the bridge team that clinched silver after scoring 152 in the final against Hong Kong China across six sessions.

The Indian men’s bridge team at the Asian Games 2023 comprised Shivdasani, Sandeep Thakral, Rajeshwar Tiwari, Sumit Mukherjee, Raju Tolani and Ajay Prabhakar Khare.

Incidentally, Shivadasani, Tiwari and Mukherjee were also part of the squad that bagged the men’s team bronze when bridge made its debut at the Asian Games in 2018.