There has been a lot of hue and cry, lamentation, accusations, counter accusations, and vilification after India ignominiously failed to qualify for the Olympics 2008. There has been a strong demand for the IHF President K.P.S Gill's head from a section of former Olympians, some disgruntled players, the media and the public. I read an article published in Asian Age on 16th March, written by Rahul Banerji, on the performance of Indian hockey team during the tenure of Gill, i.e., from 1994 onwards till date. I found the performance not that unimpressive at all. India got Gold in 1998 Asian games, Bangkok, 2001 Champion Challenge, Kuala Lumpur; India was Champion in 2003 Asia Cup, Kuala Lumpur, 2007 Asia Cup, Chennai. India held to second position in 1994 in Asian games, Hiroshima, in 2002 Asian Games, Busan. India was in third position in 1999 Asia Cup K. Lumpur, 2007 Champions Challenge, Boom. There were also quite a few fourth positions. Also, Gill claims that India has been doing very well in the junior and sub-junior levels. I have no comments on whether Gill should resign, or he should be sacked, or he should complete his tenure, as I think the failure is not a matter of one individual or just a single sport. As far as hockey is concerned, India's failure brings a lot of sadness to the romantic, nostalgic sports lovers, because India has been 8 times (6 in a row from 1928 to 1956) Olympic Champions. But unfortunately, this was the tale of the past, as India's rot started since the introduction of Astro Turfs in the early seventies. The winning of Gold in the Moscow Olympic in 1980, where only a few hockey powers participated, was a fluke. Since then we have hoped for good results every time India participated in an international tournament, but have not done anything to rejuvenate the system. So, every time we met with disappointment. Not only in hockey, but also in other sports (save for cricket), too, there is a need to overhaul the system.
1. Infrastructure: "There is a severe inadequacy of basic sports infrastructure at the grassroots level, especially in rural areas. Similarly, there is also a lack of sports competitions in the rural areas. The access to sports and games facilities in schools and colleges is very discouraging with hardly 30 million out of the 210 million students having such access. Overall, hardly 50 million out of the 770 million youth, adolescents and children have access to organised sports."( http://sportal.nic.in/shownews.asp?nid=190&maincatid=68) As far as hockey is concerned, I was listening to a television discussion where one expert told that even an ordinary town in Holland has more number of Astro Turfs than entire India has. Recently, in an article in a magazine, one former Olympian demanded installation of at least 100 new Astro Turfs in India. He also demanded one time release of rupees 500 crore exclusively for hockey. Considering this year's normal sports budget of 1111.81 crore rupees (http://www.domain-b.com/economy/budget/union_budget_2008/spreport/20080301_sports_gets.html), he maybe a bit emotional. Also, India deserves equivalent development of all other sports. My proposal is that there should be a national academy, and 5 regional academies for every major sport. Some of the sports of similar nature can be clubbed together in a single academy for convenience. "Panchayat Yuva Krida Aur Khel Abhiyan (PYKKA)", as one can find in the above link, is an innovative proposal. But I am not too optimistic about its successful implementation, because the panchayat system itself has not stood on its feet in the country yet.
2. Foreign Coaches: Since foreign exchange reserve is no longer a constraint, it is imperative to introduce foreign coaches in various games, where our coaches lack technical expertise. Giving the Australian Ric Charlesworth the responsibility of reviving hockey is a forward-looking step in my opinion. It should be ensured that he gets all the co-operation and assistance that he needs. We should be very selective about choosing foreign coaches. They should be as eminent and experienced as Ric is. In football we have been settling for some ordinary foreign coaches in the recent past.
3.Preparing national coaches: Our own national players and coaches should be given proper training for coaching. They should be sent to foreign countries for undergoing training courses. More former players should be encouraged to take coaching as their career.
4. Talent search: The Sports Authority of India has been doing the job, without much success. The number of students under SAI is very meagre: around 9645 covered under 4 schemes such as the NSTC, the ABSC, the SAG and the STC (visit http://sportsauthorityofindia.nic.in/default.htm). As proposed in the PYKKA, the annual block and district level competitions, beside the state and national level competitions should provide scope for selecting talents.
5.More foreign exposure to the players: India can afford to do so. It makes them feel the toughness of competition form the early age.
6. Ensure jobs for the players: Those players undergoing training in the academies who do not make it to the top, should be given alternative job prospects so that they can whole-heartedly concentrate on the game. Inducting them as game teachers in schools is one way of doing so.
7. Bring professionals with managerial skills to head sports: Initially helping a sport by providing government money is okay, but a sport cannot depend on government support perpetually. As cricket has proved to be a great commercial success, other sports too can emulate it, if managed properly. For football and hockey, it is rather difficult to lure the advertisers in the same way as cricket does, but tennis can do so, as it is also full of breaks (though not as much as cricket has) and has some good-looking stars.
8. Responsibility of the media: Media has a great responsibility in popularising sports. If it gives three-fourth of the sports space to cover only cricket, then it is indeed difficult for other sports to flourish. Maybe the media is catering to the interest of the public. But, the interest of the public is not a constant thing; it can be altered. Even the minor successes in other sports should be highlighted in a big way. Vishwanathan Anand is perhaps the greatest sports person India has ever produced, but he does not get even one-tenth of the coverage that Sachin Tendulkar gets. In school and competitive examinations, some compulsory questions should be asked from various sports.
There can be several other suggestions, but following the aforesaid steps India can improve rapidly in various sports. Making a priority list is not a bad step, as we should give more encouragement to those sports where India can get more medals quickly. But omitting hockey from the priority list, though Mani Shankar Aiyar can gloat now after this debacle in Santiago, was a strange decision to say the least.
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