India should soon have its first Olympics sponsor, a sign of the country’s growing Games influence

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PARIS (AP) — The International Olympic Committee expects to add an Indian sponsor soon in a sign of the country’s growing influence over the Olympics during a bid to host the 2036 Summer Games.

The IOC currently has 15 top-tier partners, which collectively paid almost $740 million last year in cash and services, though none from India.

“We would love to welcome a first new TOP sponsor from India and I am sure that this is going to happen very, very soon,” Anne-Sophie Voumard, the IOC’s marketing director said Wednesday, using the acronym of The Olympic Partner commercial program.

“For us, it is certainly a country that we believe has a lot of potential, including on commercial,” Voumard said. “Its GDP is increasing and developing really, really nicely.”

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi told Olympic sports officials last year that the country would bid to host in 2036 during a speech in Mumbai, where the IOC had its annual meeting.

The 111 IOC members include Nita Ambani, the wife of India’s richest man, Mukesh Ambani, who heads the Reliance Industries conglomerate. The lavish wedding of their son, Anant, made global headlines ahead of the ceremony last month.

Celebrations for the celebrity-packed wedding were held at the same Reliance-owned convention center in Mumbai where the IOC met nine months earlier. Some IOC members, including FIFA president Gianni Infantino, attended both events.

The Reliance charitable foundation is hosting an India House hospitality venue in Paris, opened by Ambani and his wife on July 27, which has been a discreet projection of the country’s Olympic ambitions.

The IOC has at least one sponsor deal ending this year, with