India to bid for 2036 Olympics

AFP, New Delhi :
India is planning a bid for the 2036 Olympic Games and will lobby for hosting rights at an International Olympic Committee (IOC) meeting next year, the country’s sports minister said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has been vying to establish India as a global sporting power and has shovelled money into domestic infrastructure.
Ahmedabad in Modi’s home state of Gujarat — India’s candidate for Olympic host city — is the site of the largest stadium in the world, opened in 2020 and named after the leader.
Sports minister Anurag Thakur told the Times of India newspaper it was the “right time” for his country to pitch for the world’s largest sporting event.
“If India is putting in so much effort to promote sports, I can assure you that we will not only host the Olympics, we will host it in a big way,” he said in an interview published Wednesday.