The Hardships

Between London 1948 and Helsinki 1952, Khashaba's world changed completely. The princely states were merged into the Indian Union, and with Kolhapur's court went the patronage that had underwritten wrestling in western Maharashtra for generations. The wrestler was better than he had ever been; the system that was meant to carry him no longer existed.

The 1948 result

Khashaba had returned from his first Olympics at London with a sixth-place finish in the flyweight division — no medal, but a result that proved he belonged at the highest level. He had beaten Australia and the United States; he had lost only to the formidable Iranian champion. He came home certain that a medal was within reach if he could compete at the next Games, four years later in Helsinki.

For the full record of his London 1948 and Helsinki 1952 bouts, see the Olympics page.

Overlooked again

Khashaba had beaten the formidable, six-foot Niranjan Das at the national championships — on more than one occasion. It should have settled the question of the bantamweight place for Helsinki. It did not: he was initially passed over by the selectors.

What rescued his Olympic career was an intervention by the Maharaja of Patiala, who arranged a decisive rematch. Khashaba won it, and his place on the Indian team was finally confirmed.

Selected, and penniless

The place came without funding. The Government of India had sanctioned money for the team, but by the accounts of those close to him, those funds never reached Khashaba. A direct request for four thousand rupees in assistance was turned down by the state's Chief Minister, Morarji Desai — the same leader who would garland Khashaba on his triumphant return a few months later. He lacked not only training expenses and airfare but the basic kit an Olympian was expected to own — socks, a blazer for the ceremonies.

How a village sent a man to the Olympics

What happened next is the part of the story that gives this Foundation its reason to exist.

• Principal Khardikar of Rajaram College, Kolhapur — the same institution that had once doubted whether Khashaba was strong enough to wrestle for it — mortgaged his own house for ₹7,000 to send his student to Finland.
• His coach, Govind Purandare, lent a further ₹3,000.
• The people of Goleshwar and the surrounding district contributed what they could, in small sums, for kit and travel.

Every receipt kept

Khashaba treated these contributions as debts, not gifts. He kept the receipts. After Helsinki he wrestled exhibition bouts across Maharashtra until every rupee had been repaid.

He remains, so far as the record shows, the only Indian Olympic medallist to have reached the Games on public donations — and one of very few anywhere to have repaid them.

What he did with the chance

On 23 July 1952, at the Messuhalli in Helsinki, Khashaba Jadhav won the bronze medal in bantamweight freestyle wrestling — becoming the first athlete of independent India to win an individual Olympic medal. The full bout-by-bout record is on the Olympics page.