Indian Sports Needs A Push-08 October 2010,

Indian Sports Needs A Push

Priyanka Bhardwaj

08 October 2010, 02:07 PM IST

As I was playing my early morning ‘passive session’ of tennis my thoughts wandered to the competing sportspersons at the various Commonwealth Games (CWG) events in New Delhi.

Back at my workstation, I reminisced the good old days when my brothers and I would be chasing a football or a cricket-ball across vast green expanses that doubled as lawns at our colonial bungalow in the wooded fringes of Chhota Nagpur Plateau.

Sports definitely stood me in good stead.

I learnt to play with my ‘barbaric’ opponents, develop a team spirit with my fellow ‘barbarians’, turn tables when opponents were at an advantage and even learnt to take defeat most humbly.

Confrontations, direct and indirect, during matches established how opponents would never exhibit mercy while exploiting the enemy’s weaknesses and yet all of it would end on a ‘handshake.’

My thoughts on sports as a profession have thrown up ideas that I would like to share.

Firstly, as India makes a global mark in so many other spheres (software, medicine, hospitality, auto-sector, telecom, etc to name some) it desperately needs a comprehensive sports policy.

This should comprise multiple incentives --- cash, facilities, right diet, administration, guidance, etc for budding sportspersons to win laurels.

There is need to promote rural and urban talent, broad basing of sports, synergizing educational, employment and sports systems, harnessing of talent at the grass roots level and addressing sports infrastructure.

The idea cannot venture far from making honest efforts to shape talent and instilling a sense of pride and belonging to the state.

An important factor has to be money. In present times especially, it is clear that economics rules our lives, work and even passion.

Sports rewards and financial support during training periods have proved to be important catalysts to bring out high levels of performance.

Our current role models or icons, be it in IT, politics, banking, medicine, engineering, entertainment arena, sports, etc, are known for their excellence and also rank as highest earners.

The rhetoric for more funding cannot be taken as simply a debate of morality but of economics.

As in other vocations, professional players too have to invest their teenage and youth years in honing skills to perform.

Money incentives translate into a sustainable life and support, while proper management creates sports hubs and spirit.

Given loopholes, it will need to be ensured that such efforts are not reduced to a government led money-sapping enterprise. The linked enterprises of stadiums, coaches, endorsers, game sponsors, makers of memorabilia, caterers too need to make their ends meet.

Sportspersons, at the end of the day are not mere entertainers.

While passion may enable accomplishment of dizzying levels of success, ensuring a regular source of income/compensation would be needed to develop a bigger pool of talent, as is happening due to IPL cricket.

Consider the risks involved in playing games: players can get fired for a single bad or wrong performance or can get injured for a lifetime.

Monthly upkeeps, rewards, allowances, etc cannot be so trivial that the players are distracted psychologically and physically in meeting ends to sustain their family living and sports training on or off games’ seasons.

When it comes to the prize money, it has always bewildered me to see how often it is grossly inadequate.

Perhaps there could be a creative linking up of grass roots schemes like National Rural Employment Guarantee Act with sports system to tap the aggressive and raw talent at the bottom of socio-economic pyramid.

When it comes to earnings within the sports or from endorsements it is only the top creamy layer of a chosen few games that rake the moolah. The rest have to somehow fend for even a decent livelihood.

It is too harsh to grudge many of our sports persons a sense of purpose while pursuing such a short-lived career? Not every player gets absorbed as a coach.

Another idea is an efficient sports management system to spot talent and an information dissemination system with the help of the web-based online platform. As technology is quite accessible it would not be a very expensive proposition.

Profiles of players could be posted online to showcase their experiences and videos of their played matches.

Of course care has to be taken not to make sports move away from its core values as in any other profession. There can not be a let away for declining performance especially when a player is busy endorsing high end products.

Indian sportspersons today tackle diverse set of challenges to win laurels however few they may be. This has been amply demonstrated at the ongoing CWG where Indian sportspersons have already won the 15th gold for the country.

Sporting potential has never been India’s forte.

It is time sports are not left anymore to the individual efforts of the sportspersons or media or canny endorsers.