Aman Sehrawat has done it. He has bagged India’s sixth medal in the ongoing Paris Olympics 2024. With the latest Bronze medal, India now sits on the 66th position.
As of now, India has one Silver and five Bronze medals. The country’s star athlete, Neeraj Chopra, won the only Silver medal in the men’s Javelin Throw final on August 8 with a throw of 89.45m. The Tokyo Olympics Gold medalist was beaten by Pakistan’s Arshad Nadeem who stole the show with a 92.97m throw, setting a new Olympic record.
Nadeem’s Gold medal opened Pakistan’s account on the medal tally. With this medal, Pakistan zoomed past India in the rankings and is now at the 56th position.
Following the events of August 8, Pakistan secured the 53rd position, courtesy their single gold medal, while. India was ranked 64th.
Now let’s understand why has India, having six medals, been placed behind Pakistan.
Olympics ranking system
As per the Olympic ranking system, a country with a higher number of Gold medals gets ranked higher. The system prioritises gold medals over other types of medals.
Let’s take an example here. At the time of writing this, China is ranked first in the medal tally with a total of 78 medals, while the US stands second with 108. This is merely because China has 32 Gold medals while the US has 31. Besides, Gold, US has more Silver and Bronze medals than China.
If two countries have the same number of Gold medals, then the priority will be given to the number of Silver medals. The count of Silver and Bronze medals is considered only when two nations have the same number of gold medals.
In case two countries have the exact number of Gold, Silver and Bronze medals, then they are given the same ranking. This is the case with France and Great Britain right now. Both countries have been placed fourth with 14 Gold, 20 Silver and 22 Bronze medals each.