It's easy to declare the 2012 Olympics as another washout for India. With four medals as of Wednesday evening, the world's second most populous country stands 45th in the medals table, 69 behind top-ranked China. India's beloved field hockey team, which has accounted for most of its 24 medals over a century of Olympic competition—incidentally, only two more than American swimmer Michael Phelps—has lost every match it played. The supposed rising power trails the Dominican Republic and Jamaica.

But India's Olympic glass is actually half full. Compared to how dismally India used to perform, it's begun to turn things around. The country will end these Olympics with its richest ever haul of medals.

No less significantly, a new can-do spirit has begun to replace the drooping shoulders of the past. Earlier this week, Indians were glued to the television as Mary Kom punched her way into the boxing semi-finals. Sports Minister Ajay Maken excitedly tweeted Tuesday that, before London, only five Indian athletes had ever qualified for the finals of a track and field Olympics event. In these Games alone, three made the cut.

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