Indian sports across the board are on a
bicycle-stand-collapse mode. The humiliation at Eden Gardens on Sunday was the
new low of this free fall. For England the happy hours started shortly after
lunch on Saturday, when they picked up six wickets for 36 runs. Only R Ashwin
stood in the way from an innings defeat.
For a country where cricket is nothing short of religion,
losing back-to-back matches on the home turf is nothing short of sacrilege. The
players got pilloried by all and sundry. Amidst this entire din, Indian hockey
squad, which lost to Pakistan in Champions Trophy for third position, got off
lightly. But to be fair to them, their performance in this tournament was far
more laudatory.
A couple of days ago it was India's Olympic shame, with the
International Olympic Committee suspending the Indian Olympic Association for violation
of the international Olympic Charter. At least in this case the players were
not to blame. In fact they had done the
country proud by bringing in the richest haul of medals in the country's history at the recently concluded Olympics.
The suspension will prevent them from competing
in the Olympics under the Indian flag. For the athletes it is a harsh punishment
for no fault of theirs. This suspension could also cost them in terms of
funding from international organisations. Barely have we started tasting some
success at Olympics, but now it looks like it’s going to be snuffed out.
Following IOC's example, the international boxing body International
Boxing Association (AIBA) also decided to provisionally suspend the Indian Amateur
Boxing Federation (IABF). Boxing has brought many laurels to us in international events and we can ill
afford to allow the suspension to happen.
On both counts the international bodies have objected to the
way elections to these sports bodies were recently held, which of course were riddled with allegations of nepotism and corruption. Its an open secret that almost all sports bodies in the country
are dominated by politicians with dubious credentials, with some like Suresh Kalmadi
even having served jail terms. They are attracted because of the money involved; nurturing talented sportspersons is the last thing in their minds. Not surprisingly, they inspire little confidence among
international sporting bodies.
It’s time we brought in candidates who are interested in
sports, preferably former sportspersons or coaches and those industrialists who
have set up institutes to nurture sports, like say MRF pace academy or Tata
football academy.
Hitherto, if at all we have produced sportsperson of world
class stature, the country's sports system had little role in it. They all came
up despite the system and each sportsperson has his/her story to say as to how much
they had to struggle to overcome the obstacles posed by the system. It’s time
we made the system work for them.
Also Read: Bangalore Beat
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