Olympians from Belagavi

The Rio Olympics is currently in Progress and lets go into history to see who all represented from Belgaum (now Belagavi) in the Olympics.

This is not an exhaustive list.

All the below matter has been verified with the Olympics website for authenticity. There were a couple of Olympians who studied in St.Pauls and then later represented Kenya as they shifted there.

Phadeppa D Chougle of Belagavi known as “Pavanajaneya” the Ist Olympian of the Nation having participated in the 1920 Olympic Marathon Race held at Antwerp, Belgium.

Phadeppa (Pavananjey) Dareppa Chaugule is India’s first Olympic marathon runner. He represented India in the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp, Belgium and finished 19th with a timing of 2 hours 50 minutes 45.2 seconds.
He was born in 1902 in to a Jain farmer family from Sheri Galli. He used to practice for the marathon by running bare footed from Belgaum to Khanapur.   He expired in 1952.

 

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Bandu Patil (January 1, 1936 – August 23, 1988) Bandu Patil represented the Indian Hockey team, which won Silver medal & Gold medal during 1960 & 1964 Olympics.

1960 Rome Olympics- Silver
1964 Tokyo Olympics- Gold
1962 Asian Games – Silver

The Belgaum Cantonment had planned to rename the Khanapur road from Sanchayni Circle to Suryakant Park (Gogte circle) as Bandu Patil (He was a part of the gold medal winning Indian hockey team in the 1960’s) road, but it was later found that, the same road was named after Maj.Cariappa in the military records.

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Shankar Laxman  (July 7 1933 – April 29, 2006) was an Indian hockey player. He was goalkeeper of the Indian team in the 1956, 1960 and 1964 Olympics, that won two gold medals and one silver medal. He was the first goalkeeper to become captain of an international hockey team and was awarded the Arjuna award and the Padmasri by the Indian government. In 1979 Laxman retired as an honorary captain in the Maratha Light Infantry.

We have included Shankar Laxman here as it is believed he spent most of his life in Belgaum serving the MLIRC.

 

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Sahana Kumari a high jumper has been selected for the 2012 London Olympics. Born and brought up in Ullal. Her connection to Belgaum is her Husband Nagaraj who is also an athlete studied in Belgaum with his grand parents who still stay in Belgaum.

 

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Mohan Ramchandra Patil took part in the Men’s Greco-Roman 57 kg at the 1992 Summer Olympics held at Barcelona.

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R.S.P. Dalgado studied in St.Paul’s high school then went to Kenya and represented Kenya’s Hockey team in 1956 Melbourne Olympics.

Reynold Anthony D’Souza who studied in St.Paul’s high school then went to Kenya and represented Kenya’s Hockey team in 1956 Melbourne and 1964 Tokyo Olympics.

Saude André N. George who studied in St.Paul’s high school then went to Kenya and represented Kenya’s Hockey team in 1960 Rome and 1964 Tokyo Olympics.