The Indian athlete who won the gold medal in Tokyo 2020, Neeraj Chopra is also a student, who is pursuing Bachelor in Arts (B.A) from Jalandhar-based college Lovely Professional University (LPU). The entire country of a billion people celebrated Chopra’s gold victory. LPU announced a cash reward of Rs 50 lakh with great honour on August 9, for their Olympic medalist student Neeraj Chopra who made the country proud in the multi-sporting event.
When Chopra came into the finals of the men’s javelin throw event he took a magnificent shot, and he threw a javelin with the effort of 87.03 on his first attempt, 87.58 on his second and 76.79 on the third attempt.
Bajrang Punia is also rewarded by the university with the cash prize of Rs 10 lakh for winning the bronze medal in the men’s freestyle 65 kg wrestling category. Bajrang Punia beat his opponent Daulet Niyazbekov of Kazakhstan with a score of 8-0 at Tokyo Olympic, he is also a student of LPU who is pursuing M.A. in Public Administration from LPU. A total of 11 students of Lovely professional university participated in the Tokyo Olympics and one of them was the captain of the Men’s Hockey team Manpreet Singh and out of those nine players have won a medal for India.
Ashok Mittal, Chancellor of LPU said, “Neeraj has made the entire country proud by winning the first-ever medal for India in a track and field event in Olympics. He has ended a 100+ year drought with his performance and showed that Indian athletes can outperform anyone on the world stage with proper training and effort. His effort will make millions of Indians dream to become an athlete and bring about a sports revolution. The same is true for Bajrang Punia as well. We are extremely proud and fortunate to count them as our students and look forward to welcoming these brave hearts back at the campus.” Neeraj and Bajrang have won medals in individual events, the university announced that they are also giving the reward of Rs 70 lakh to their students who were a member of the victorious hockey team at the Games.