By Prerna Tyagi:
Cricket World Cup 2011, the biggest rage these days ranging from countless pages on Facebook saying ‘Hope India wins this time’ etc to the Dhoni ‘n’ Saif Ali Khan’s advertisement ‘Lays World Cup’, think DiLogical. Hope all the logic and arithmetic works in the favor of the Indian Cricket team but coming into the fourth month after witnessing the biggest Indian Sporting Event, CWG 2010, the laurels and medals might have been forgotten but the scams are still like fresh wounds which continuously remind us of how the public money found its way into the coffers of the public servants. India’s biggest sporting venture which brought us 38 Gold medals will be remembered more for bad reasons than for good. It is doubtful whether the innumerable scams associated with CWG would ever come into the limelight.
Today the question that comes to my mind is ‘Was it the right time for us to host the second biggest sporting event of the world?’
As comparisons are inevitable, China, a world class sporting nation has earned the title by sheer determination and hard work. The Chinese Government revolutionized the face of sports in the country. Sports as a career field, considered unpredictable, saw many young Chinese men and women coming forward and joining the Sports Revolution. They were groomed to compete with the World Class Sports persons from the best sporting nations like United States and Australia. The budding sport stars were provided with top-class sports infrastructure, facilities, ample opportunities, huge sport in terms of both finance and training.
It indeed required an initial huge investment but when China won 63 medals in the 2004 Athens Olympics, ranking third in the medal tally, it was a clear message that China and its people couldn’t have settled for less. Four years later the world saw the much awaited 2008 Beijing Olympics becoming a huge success which brought both money and fame to the country and took China to the top of the world’s sports league.
Sometimes your neighbors could be great teachers. The money that was put into the CWG, even if half of it would have been put to improve the sports facilities of the country providing every sport aspirant with best playing conditions, world class training, financial support and the much needed recognition then the scenario would have been totally different. We somehow bought the little recognition that CWG brought us but we did not earn it as even a week before the CWG inauguration, some very important Indian Sports personalities were not satisfied with the training and the facilities available to them, leave alone the lesser known sporting stars.
The facilities for sports have never been satisfactory in India in sports apart from cricket. Instead of taking up huge projects in their hands, the Government should first make sure that the roots of sports in the country are strong then only can we actually expect the fruits to be sweet. Post CWG, with India’s not so good performance in the Asian games, it only shows that we have just put forth the step towards working for Indian Sports but a lot needs to be thought, planned and executed to find India a place in the World’s top sporting league.
Hope the London Olympics next year see us craving for more medals than getting satisfied with a medal or two!