Commonwealth Games may boost India’s Olympic participation, but medals are far from guaranteed

CWG boost does show in Olympic participation

• Hosting Commonwealth Games boosts athlete participation for future Olympics
• India doubled Olympic medals after 2010 CWG but failed to win gold
• Most hosts see more CWG medals, not sustained Olympic success

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Hosting the Commonwealth Games could strengthen India's case for the 2036 Olympics by ensuring that a large part of the sporting and urban infrastructure is already in place. But a possible benefit, even if it can’t secure the 2036 Olympics bid, could be a rise in athlete participation. Historical evidence suggests that hosting the Commonwealth Games does not automatically translate into a higher Olympic medal haul.

“The 2030 Commonwealth Games will be held in India, and the country is making strong efforts to host the 2036 Olympics,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said.

A Moneycontrol analysis of past Commonwealth Games hosts shows that improvements in Olympic medal tallies after hosting have been uneven.

India stands out as a partial exception. After hosting the Commonwealth Games in 2010, India doubled its Olympic medal count to six at the London 2012 Games from three at the Beijing Olympics in 2008.

Even so, this outcome is an outlier, as the country failed to secure a single gold medal.

For most other host nations, the Olympic dividend has been limited or absent. Australia, which hosted the Commonwealth Games in 2006 and again in 2018, did not see a comparable jump in Olympic medals following either edition. England, despite hosting the Games twice, also failed to record a sustained improvement. Malaysia’s experience was more stark, as it did not win a single medal at the Sydney 2000 Olympics after hosting the games in 1998.

Where hosting makes a more consistent difference is in participation. CWG host countries tended to send larger contingents to subsequent Olympics. Malaysia increased its Olympic participation to 40 athletes in 2000 from 35 previously. India saw an even sharper rise, fielding 83 athletes at the London 2012 Games compared with 56 at Beijing in 2008.

The most visible and sustained gains for host nations emerge not at the Olympics, but within the Commonwealth Games themselves. India’s 2010 Games proved to be a turning point: across the three Commonwealth Games editions after hosting (2014-2022), India won 33 more medals than it had in the three editions before 2010. Other hosts experienced even stronger rebounds. Scotland’s medal tally rose 68 percent in the game following the 2014 Glasgow edition, while Malaysia recorded a dramatic 494 percent increase, from just six medals before hosting in 1998 to 33 medals across the 2002–2010 Commonwealth Games.