India and
Olympics
How should a
return of two medals from the Rio Olympics be assessed? Dipa Karmakar and Abhinav Bindra who finished fourth, Sania Mirza and
Rohan Bopanna who lost the bronze medal match, the women’s archery team which
came close, and men’s hockey team which showed substantial improvement – they
missed to win medals.
In the first
place, does India have the infrastructure and coaching facilities to produce
medal winners consistently? India’s lone individual gold-medallist is Bindra.
To win medals in Olympics, our people should cease to see sport as a pastime.
It is true that modern-day sport is professional at its core and helps in
creating jobs and businesses. The success
of P.V. Sindhu and Sakshi Malik is representative of what a good sporting
culture can achieve.
Sporting win at
international level requires eight plus years of dedication and commitment -
very hard to sustain without any ‘realistic prospect’ of winning, and lack of a
clear path even after winning. Sporting injury can ruin one’s chance of success
as well as life. Today, which well-to-do family in India will encourage their 7
or 8 year old to work hard at building general strength in the gym and then
learn their sport, spending upwards of 6 hours per day when young, and 8 – 10
per day, every day? Will the parent go jogging at 5 am, or shuttle between gym,
sports hall, school and home, every day for 10 years?
Going by the
title, we have miles to go to reap any benefits - overshadowed by politics in
all aspects, not barring sports or playing around with anybody's luck whether
its personal or professional life. We need to strengthen our basics and broaden
the horizons of economic viability and systematise our functioning in 'ALL'
offices to talk about anything sensible. There are many gems all over the
place. It's just that some are hidden without access to funds or exposure, some
are stabbed to humiliation or death and some are backed by 'political
affiliations, or regional affiliations' and are 'discovered' with nominal
functioning - in any field, not just sports.
The current
generation cannot be forced but can be easily moved towards sport if provided
reputation and awards as cricket players are given. In a country where sports
were a part of culture since ancient times, the dearth of sportspersons is not
a problem. What is needed is a system of training and establishment of sporting
facilities including making sports part and parcel of school education.
Competition in
India is often about a family enterprise rather than an individual endeavour.
In countries producing successful athletes, particularly in East Asia, Europe,
and America, individual competitiveness is inculcated from a very early stage
of a child's life. Whereas here, even when they grow up to become young adults,
we get involved in building their career, and we even choose the choicest mates
for them.
Money poured
into facilities will only improve performance where individual competitiveness
is already evident. The Olympic achievements depends
upon the system and unbiased selection of players and the dedication of the
players with patriotism. Last time we won six medals but this time we have to
be satisfied with a couple. The nasty politics in selection of players to the
global games, lack of infrastructure to training, not recognising players with
outstanding talent and no facilities to sharpen their talent are the key
reasons for country with 137 crores of people having high vacuum in games .Right
now the sports ministry need to do some introspection towards Olympic game and
make corrections to win remarkably in the next Olympics.
No comments:
Post a Comment