Who is Dhinidhi Desinghu? All you need to know about India's youngest athlete at the Paris Olympics 2024

With the Paris Olympics 2024 around the corner, Dhinidhi Desinghu is a name that has been making waves recently in Indian sports. The 14-year-old swimmer from Bengaluru is all set to rewrite history as the youngest athlete of the Indian contingent traveling to Paris for the Summer Olympics 2024.

Dhinidhi Desinghu will be raising the Indian flag high at the grandest stage that any sportsperson wishes for. She will be competing in the women’s 200m freestyle event against some of the greatest swimmers in the world, like world record holder Ariarne Titmus.

You must be wondering how the Swimming Federation of India (SFI) selected such a young athlete to represent India at the Olympics. Well, the answer to that is the Universality Quota. The Indian swimmers failed to earn a direct qualification spot as none of them breached either the “A” or “B” qualification time.

Thus, SFI requested World Aquatics to approve Universality Places, which allows the top-ranked athletes from a country, both male and female, to participate in the Summer Olympics.

Srihari Nataraj (849 points) and Dhinidhi Desinghu (749 points) were leading their respective categories in the world aquatics rankings at the end of the cut-off date - June 23. They will now represent India at the Paris Olympics 2024 in swimming.

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How did Dhinidhi Desinghu get into swimming?

Hailing from Bengaluru, Dhinidhi’s parents, Jesitha Vijayan and Desinghu Pundi Srinivasan, enrolled her in swimming classes at the age of six. However, due to her fear of water, Dhinidhi refused to take the classes.

To avoid wasting the fees that had been paid, her parents took the classes themselves. Seeing them swim without any danger, Dhinidhi felt confident getting into the pool but still struggled during competitions.

At one tournament, which was a short race and with minimal efforts to hold on to the board and work the kick, Dhinidhi ended up finishing third. She started winning state-level meets in 2019 and then enrolled at Dolphin Aquatics, where coach Madhukumar BM fine-tuned her skills, making Dhinidhi a dominant force at the age-group levels.

Dhinidhi’s breakthrough moment came when she broke the national record in women’s 200m freestyle with a timing of 2:04.24 in July 2023 at the Indian Championships in Hyderabad. She then clinched gold at the 76th Senior National Aquatic Championships and seven medals at the National Games 2023.

Her performances saw her join the Indian contingent at the Asian Games 2023 in Hangzhou. Dhinidhi finished fourth in her heat and was a part of the women’s 4×100m freestyle and 4x200m freestyle relay teams that broke the national record.

Dhinidhi Desinghu now has her eyes set on the Paris Olympics 2024, where she will want to give her best and inspire the kids her age to take up sports.