Is sports in India deteriorating? This is the question that haunts every sports-loving individual in this “world’s largest working democracy”.
Malleswari won the lone bronze medal for India in the recent Sydney Olympics, saving face and humiliation of a country with over one billion people. Authorities from all corners of the “nation” assembled to analyze the dismal performance at Sydney. They discussed and criticized the sports infrastructure that existed at the primary level, from schools to colleges, from villages to cities. Lack of professionalism was the other factor raised.
But one vital phenomenon remained untouched – the untouchability factor, the discrimination in the selection policy. Has the caste system, the sanctified racism in India, got to do anything with sports? Sounds absurd for a non-Indian, and unfortunately for majority of Indians too. Remember Malleswari is a non-vegetarian, Dalit sports woman, and she just managed to grab a ticket to the Olympics, fighting extreme discrimination.
Pakistanis are beefeaters: Hockey was one game that fetched medals for India in the yesteryears. India and Pakistan dominated the hockey era in the formative years with their natural skills exhibited on conductive grass fields. It did not take long for the Europeans to outpower the giants from the sub-continent. They replaced skill with speed and athleticism, by strategically introducing synthetic grounds. Skill and the traditional approach no longer mattered, and what mattered was power and aggression at the highest competitive level which the poor Indians never possessed. The glory of hockey ended there and our discussion on hockey ends here.
Cricket as India’s religion: Cricket’ is the new religion of India, as the saying goes. Cricket is in fact the only hope that prevails despite the high voltage drama involved in the match fixing episode where Mohammed Azharuddin, India’s most successful cricket captain, became the lone victim and stalwarts like Kapil Dev, Sunil Gavaskar and the likes go through.
Lack of bowlers: Let us now explore a new dimension to discrimination from the cricket perspective. The case study that follows should open fresh awareness of disgust to the sports-loving, cricket-mad nation. Javagal Srinath is supposed to be the fastest bowler, Indian cricket has ever produced, and he is a vegetarian Brahmin (though he has started enjoying the non-vegetarian menu in ‘recent years). On the other hand, the irony is that Pakistan, India’s strongest rival in the sports, continues to produce high quality fast bowlers on a consistent basis with a never- say-die attitude. The lack of genuine fast bowlers in India, despite their counterpart producing them in abundance, ignited the long-awaited brainstorming, debate a couple of years.
Two significant opinions evolved from the discussion involving experts all over India. One, Imran Khan, the greatest Pakistani captain, possessed the charisma and courage to revamp the slow pitches in Pakistan and replace them with the ones conductive to fast bowlers. We, India, did not produce a cricketing brain like Imran, but Indian cricket could at least have duplicated the strategies of the great all-rounder.
The second point that came up in the analysis was revealing. Power being the key to fast bowling, Pakistan kept producing them due to the non-vegetarian culture prevailing there. India on the other hand was adamant only in providing opportunities to vegetarian Brahmins.
English speaking cricketers: Another interesting debate struck the author recently. Abdurrazak, the young discovery for Pakistan in the recent world cup, communicated in Urdu during the “man of the match” award facilitation ceremony. Some of the comments from the Indian viewers went to the extent of accusing Pakistan of producing uneducated cricketers who were not even proficient in the English language. The counter argument was embarrassing for the over enthusiastic Indian viewers. Well, it’s true that every individual Indian cricketer in the current team speak English but how many of us know that only less than 4% of the one billion people in India read/write/ speak English.
This gives a direct indication that only 4% of the population is eligible for selection in the Indian cricket team. And remember Brahmins comprising 5% of the total population grab the bulk of sporting opportunities.
Changing the destiny of sports is neither a priority nor a possibility now for India. But if the sports scenario is to make any significant inroads, then it should begin with providing basic infrastructure and opportunities to the discriminated majority of India.
