If you think Williams sisters, Wough brothers, Tendulkar-Kambli, Boxers from Cuba are the great examples of childhood friends/siblings playing all the way to the international levels, take a break and consider a moment when 7 childhood friends played in the same Oplympics, of which 5 represented only one country. This happened in Mexico Olympics, 1968. A total of 7 players belonged to the same small village of Sansarpur (Punjab) with a population of ~4000 only. Five of the 7 players played for Indian hockey team and 2 for Kenyan. In total, this village contributed 120 hockey players at national and international levels and of which 15 were Olympians. Is there any match? Unfortunately, Sansarpur is a forgotten legacy now.
(Image: 7 players from Sansarpur played in the Mexico Olympics, 1968)
Recently I thought of looking at my own Sansarpur. Where are my college mates now? It's an interesting exercise that any one can do in leisure time. With the deep connectivity of internet, I easily found mine Sansarpur:
1. Ram Pratap Singh: Gastroenterologist (MD, DM), Midland Heathcare, Lucknow
2. Shiv Pratap Singh: Deputy commissioner, customs and central excise, department of revenue, ministry of finance, GoI
3. Vaibhav Sinha: Senior Director, Head of Global Marketing Communications at Carl Zeiss Microscopy GmbH Jena, Thuringia, Germany
4. Rohit Anthony Sinha: Scientist at Sanjay Gandhi post graduate medical college, Lucknow.
5. Chanchal Kumar: Associate Director, Head of CVRM Bioinformatics, Astra Zeneca, Stockholm, Sweden.
6. Vidyendra sadanandan: Chief Technology Officer (CTO)), Molecular Connections, Bangalore.
7. Harkewal Singh: Manager at Kaneka US Innovation Center, California.
8. Rahul Yadav: Engineering Manager at Strand Life Sciences, Bengaluru Area, India
Seems like a success story? But hey wait a minute, the list is biased because successful people are anyway more visible on the web.
