HYDERABAD: The Union government's budgetary allocation to encourage sports and infrastructure has been meagre, and it has also failed to initiate major reform in sports, said B.V. Papa Rao, former sports administrator, retired IAS officer and filmmaker
As part of the 'Deccan Dialogues' series, Papa Rao discussed the state of sports with economist and political strategist Mohan Guruswamy. The two analysed the problems plaguing sports administration, the political stranglehold that is harming it and the necessary reforms.
Papa Rao, one of the founders of the Clean Sports India movement, which aims to reduce corruption in sports, said the movement had made an impact in 4-5 years under the UPA government, the RSS and the BJP were not allowing reforms now. Guruswamy agreed, citing the BCCI as an example of an institution dominated by BJP and RSS members.
Speaking about the plight of the Hyderabad Cricket Association (HCA), Guruswamy stated that once upon a time, Hyderabad was one of the top cricket teams in the South, hosting Test matches on a regular basis. That is no longer the case, and the HCA's members are openly looting the association. "Its members used to ride bicycles, now they drive cars," Guruswamy remarked.
According to Papa Rao, the three objectives for improving sports are to constitute an election commission to hold polls for all sports federations, to form an ethics committee to monitor sports bodies and to establish a dispute mechanism. Guruswamy emphasised how certain sporting hubs had contributed many medals, such as the two wrestling 'akhadas' in Delhi and Haryana, and Manipur in boxing, and questioned why such local influences to boost any sport could not happen elsewhere.
Papa Rao stated that he had written to then sports minister Kiren Rijiju about how the NDA government was “destroying” the ongoing programmes that had produced Olympians for the past 25-30 years. “Rijiju, although a tribal from Arunachal Pradesh, destroyed this scheme,” Papa Rao said. He said that the sports sector had received only 0.07 per cent of the Union Budget, and that both the public and private sectors needed to spend more.
When asked why women outperform men in sporting achievements in the country, Papa Rao attributed it to women being more disciplined than men in general, as well as a reaction to the repression they had faced for thousands of years. "If we spend more money on women's sports, they will fare far better than men," he asserted.
