Declining Standard of Sports in India

The disappointing performance of the Indian athletes and players in the Olympic, has made the people to think about the con­dition of sports in India. Despite our huge size in terms of popula­tion, we have not been able to leave our impact on international sports. Otherwise also Indian sports has not been able to achieve the standard which they were supposed to achieve. Athletes have been much below the standard and since the Olympic games started India has been able to bag hardly a few gold medals. Moreover, most of the medals were bagged either by our Hockey team or by our wrestlers. Does it mean that the people in India have no interest in sports and games.

In fact it has been again and again pointed out that politics in the Sports Organizations of India has spoiled the sports. The selec­tions are mostly based on favoritism and some of the outstanding sports persons are just ignored because they do not happen to be related to some influential person. Moreover, the sports bodies go on planning tours and matches fielding sub-standard sports person without thinking that the national pride will receive a serious set­back in case we are unable to win. Some of the Ministers and the political leaders want to be at the helm of affairs so that they may be able to embezzle sports funds. Under such circumstances, it is not possible to raise the standard of sports in India.

Another reason for the decline of sports in India is that we have been mostly concentrating upon the young people living in the cities. We have ignored the villagers, the tribal people and others. In fact those who live in the cities generally do not enjoy good health because of the polluted atmosphere and filthy environment. As they are brought up in the lap of luxury they cannot be hardily people. But in order to draw the attention of the villagers to sports we will have to have playgrounds as well as the facility for playing games in the villages. Competitions among the villages should be