Saina Nehwal, who put India on the world badminton map again, may well deserve the Padma Bhushan, but the manner in which her nomination was handled leaves a lot to be desired. Either the badminton association or the sports ministry seems to have messed up, and the award not only got dragged into an unnecessary controversy, but it also opened the gates for more sports stars to air their claims in public.
Logically, Saina shouldn’t have been left out of the list of nominees as she had several path-breaking performances to her credit. The point, however, is whether an award is an entitlement. There is a distinction between actively seeking an award and arguing out a point, which Saina tries to make. But should sportsmen go public to stake a claim, as some have done in the latest round of bickering over the Arjuna awards and higher civilian Padma honours?
Sportsmen and coaches should not lose out on the highest national awards just because they also get recognition in the Arjuna and Dronacharya awards — not even in these times when they are all professionals, and are amply rewarded in terms of prize money as well as government incentives that run into several lakhs of rupees per medal. What makes such issues involving sports stars prominent is the wide publicity they get. The government should ideally streamline the entire process, and set up a more transparent system of nominations, so that these are not dragged into the public domain year after year.
