Anand Krishna’s musings

In the latest reshuffle of the union cabinet, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has inducted former bureaucrat and Raja Sabha member MS Gill as Minister of State for Sports & Youth Affairs. It is well known that Mani Shankar Aiyar (himself a former IFS officer), who was the previous holder of the Sports & Youth Affairs portfolio was a reluctant Sports minister. His utterances on the irrelevance of the Commonwealth Games to India and more recently, on his inability to change things in the IHF as it is an autonomous body under the IOA are fairly well documented by the media.

Granted that MS Gill (who has also held the position of Chief Election Commissioner) is a more avid sports enthusiast than Mani Shankar Aiyar. He has been a mountaineer, has dabbled in hockey and cricket at the school level etc. He was even part of the official delegation that accompanied the Indian contingent to the Mexico Olympics nearly 40 years ago. But unless he takes urgent action to shake up India’s sports establishment, will anything change?

I’d recommend that he focuses on the following aspects:

1. Ask SAI to get every body that supposedly mnages various sports in India to develop an action plan focusing on improving perfromance in the short, medium and long-term goals.  Medium-term goals could include doubling the number of olympic gold medals in 2012, and thereafter, target a 25% increase in every subsequent olympics.  Bold and audacious? yes. But do we have a choice?
2. Get former sportspersons more actively involved  in developing the sport- whether as coaches, advisors etc. Clearly, a good player is not automatically a good coach and vice versa. But former players will understand the pulse better.
3. Actively scout for talent across the country. In certain sports, rural India may be a better breeding ground.
4. Seek corporate partcipation in developing sports other than cricket.
5. Make it mandaory for media to carry sports other than cricket. Goes against the grain of free market thinking? Yes- but again, how else do we persuade TV channels to broadcast other sports?
6. Hire the best coaches, dietitians, sports psychologists, trainers and so on to work with our budding talent in all levels. In many sports, half-baked knowledge of nutrition may be the reason for athletes ending up positive on doping tests- their coaches think something is OK when it is not.
7. Make it attractive for sportspersons in games other than cricket to pursue their sport on a professional basis, so that they are assured of financial security. Take care of insurance, healthcare etc.

Good luck, Mr Gill. Let’s see if your stint is a turning point for Indian sports.