The Race of My Life
Autobiography by Milkha Singh Indian athlete
The Race of My Life: An Autobiography is the autobiography of Indian athlete Milkha Singh, coauthored with daughter Sonia Sanwalka. The film Bhaag Milkha Bhaag is based on it.
Summary
Milkha Singh, a sikh boy born around 1930s, runs against trains for fun. A lot of his family members who belong to Milkha Singh family, including his parents, are killed in the Partition of India. After many attempts, he is finally able to join the Indian army. Whilst in the army, his athletic skills show. He wins gold medals in the 1958 Asian Games and 1958 Commonwealth Games. After winning the friendly race between India and Pakistan, in 1960, he earns the title of The Flying Sikh by Ayub Khan. However, he loses the bronze medal by fraction of a second at the 1960 Summer Olympics, due to a judgement error on the race track. In 1963, he marries his longtime love Nirmal Kaur, former captain of India's women's volleyball team.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 26, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q18164257. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1958, 1960 and 1963.
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This entry incorporates text from “The Race of My Life” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.