Dinesh Kamath's Editorial 'Why can’t we be like China?' that was published in Newsband

Why can’t we be like China?

India won the gold medal in hockey in the Asian Games in Incheon, Korea, only its third, at the expense of eight-time champion Pakistan.  India now prepares for the Rio Olympics, for which it has automatically qualified as the Asian Games champion.

Hockey apart, there were gold medals for India in athletics, kabaddi, tennis, archery, shooting, squash, boxing and wrestling. But the eventual medals tally of 57 including 11 gold, fell short of expectations. The eighth place on the medals table was not a big deal.

The main features of India’s achievement included the iconic Manipuri boxer M.C. Mary Kom’s maiden title in the Games, and the runaway victory for the women’s relay team.

These achievements showed us that there is no shortage of talent in India, just we need to harness them. Government has to frame a National Sport Policy which will be implemented by Sport Ministry. Sports should be part of the school curriculum and student should participate in at least one sport of their choice. Every state must have an Olympic like infrastructure and sport academy on the basis of NDA.

We have to start Sports institutes for children with good physique and train them in the sports of their choice. The children should be selected at school level and families of those children should be encouraged to send their children to boarding schools, where sports form the main curriculum. Their education should be taken care of. We need investment for a generation or two to see tangible results.

The show at Asiad is just peanuts as compared to our vast population. The major hindrance is lack of infrastructure at grass root level. At prime age talents should be nurtured. We should have a clear-cut vision in promoting sports.

Take the example of China. Now everyone accepts it as just next to US. Same is reflecting in the medal tally either in Olympics or in Asian games. In 1986 they just got 5 gold medals in Seoul Olympics and ranked 11th in the world. But they took the issue very seriously, as these events are watched very closely around the world. Within 20 years they got 51 gold medals in Beijing Olympics and even surpassed US and acquired rank 1. Why we can't?