India & Sports: a Good Joke?
It gives me an awkward feeling when I think that India managed to siphon only around 9 gold medals by now whereas our close neighbor plundered 147 gold medals in the Asian games. I really cannot stop refuting nor can I prevent myself from showing my dissent against the commentators who happily blame the poor athletes for putting up this abysmal performance. Dare shall we have the guts to spur such disrespect for their spirit.
If anybody has to be blamed for this pathetic state, it is the process and the attitude of the people about sports. How many of our parents would have allowed us to take up sports as a profession. We would rather be highly paid coolies morphed in the name of engineers and business graduates working for the progress of any other economy than bring laurels in sports for our country.
Let us not put a hollow statement that there is dearth of talent in this country. I certainly feel that If we cannot find talent in this 100 crore population, we can never find it elsewhere. There is a huge hue and cry that the Indian hockey team has put us to shame as they have failed to qualify to medals phase. How many of us have know that Holland has around 200 stadiums and India has hardly 20 turf stadiums and still we claim that hockey is our national sport.
We have very often observed our friends or acquaintances who were good sportspersons but dissuaded themselves from taking sports as a profession. They would choose or be forced to be a mediocre analyst rather than show their proficiency as great sportsmen. There is either the lack of parental support, social acknowledgement to take such a sporting career or financial stability to do so. There is always this fear which prevents them.
Success at the highest level of sports is all about high levels of competition and we can achieve high level of competitiveness only when we have a good talent pool. To attract the best of the breed, there needs to be a paradigm shift in the way we perceive sporting as a career option. There need to be a major impetus on sports & the essential infrastructure at all levels to breed a competitive talent pool. We need to understand that sports are as important as academics in developing a holistic personality and nation. An innate sportsperson can be identified at a very young age and they should be tuned from there.
There is this argument which crops up, in this nation when half of them are impoverished by poverty and illiteracy, is it really necessary that sports be given such impetus. If we are going to accept this fatalism, we shall at least have the grace to abstain ourselves from blaming the people who had the passion or at least the guts to take a risk to choose a sporting profession inspite of depleted infrastructure and adequate competitive environment. I am not going to deny the politics in the system but I can vouch that talent would prevail in the end if the system is corrected..
I am encouraged by the way the corporates sponsor the non mass sports like formula racing, tennis and golf. I get some respite that encouragement and funds are flowing from the private sector when the government has it own focus.Atleast we need to have the courage of what China did some years ago.China abstained itself from Olympics and other sports events till it reached a competitive level.
If anybody has to be blamed for this pathetic state, it is the process and the attitude of the people about sports. How many of our parents would have allowed us to take up sports as a profession. We would rather be highly paid coolies morphed in the name of engineers and business graduates working for the progress of any other economy than bring laurels in sports for our country.
Let us not put a hollow statement that there is dearth of talent in this country. I certainly feel that If we cannot find talent in this 100 crore population, we can never find it elsewhere. There is a huge hue and cry that the Indian hockey team has put us to shame as they have failed to qualify to medals phase. How many of us have know that Holland has around 200 stadiums and India has hardly 20 turf stadiums and still we claim that hockey is our national sport.
We have very often observed our friends or acquaintances who were good sportspersons but dissuaded themselves from taking sports as a profession. They would choose or be forced to be a mediocre analyst rather than show their proficiency as great sportsmen. There is either the lack of parental support, social acknowledgement to take such a sporting career or financial stability to do so. There is always this fear which prevents them.
Success at the highest level of sports is all about high levels of competition and we can achieve high level of competitiveness only when we have a good talent pool. To attract the best of the breed, there needs to be a paradigm shift in the way we perceive sporting as a career option. There need to be a major impetus on sports & the essential infrastructure at all levels to breed a competitive talent pool. We need to understand that sports are as important as academics in developing a holistic personality and nation. An innate sportsperson can be identified at a very young age and they should be tuned from there.
There is this argument which crops up, in this nation when half of them are impoverished by poverty and illiteracy, is it really necessary that sports be given such impetus. If we are going to accept this fatalism, we shall at least have the grace to abstain ourselves from blaming the people who had the passion or at least the guts to take a risk to choose a sporting profession inspite of depleted infrastructure and adequate competitive environment. I am not going to deny the politics in the system but I can vouch that talent would prevail in the end if the system is corrected..
I am encouraged by the way the corporates sponsor the non mass sports like formula racing, tennis and golf. I get some respite that encouragement and funds are flowing from the private sector when the government has it own focus.Atleast we need to have the courage of what China did some years ago.China abstained itself from Olympics and other sports events till it reached a competitive level.
We should cultivate the culture to enjoy sports other than cricket atleast !!
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