Relevance: GS-2: Government Policies and Interventions for Development in various sectors and Issues arising out of their Design and Implementation.

Key Phrases: Commonwealth Games, Sports governance, Committee of Administrators (CoA), Monopolistic attitude, Entry 33 of the State List, arbitrariness, lack of uniformity, training hub.

Context:

• As the strong Indian contingent for the Commonwealth Games (CWG) serially lands, sport by sport, player by player, in the UK, they carry the immense expectations of a medal-starved nation.
• In the Commonwealth (CW), while India is good, its performance is a pale shadow of China’s in the Olympics.
• India still has a long way to go to becoming the Olympic powerhouse that China has turned out to be.

Issues with Sports governance:

• Lifetime employment in the federations:
  • For sports, the national agencies still operate in the 20th-century mode with the associated mindset of lifetime employment in the federations, run like fiefdoms.
  • Judicial intervention in several cases involving national federations has brought this aspect to the fore.
  • Courts have appointed a Committee of Administrators (CoA) to run several federations temporarily including football, hockey, badminton, and table tennis to name a few. A CoA ran the cricket body for six years before handing it over to an elected board.
• Monopolistic attitude:
  • There are several sports in India that are subject to the monopolistic attitude and conduct of federations that tend to be run by bureaucrats rather than by people who know the game. The modus operandi is straightforward.
  • Federations offer the lure of selection for coaches, managers, and players, sometimes deservedly and often undeservedly.
• Corruption and Non-transparency:
  • At the governance level, corruption, lack of transparency, and unclear demarcation of rights and responsibilities have created an environment of confusion and malpractice.
• Lack of Investment:
  • Many experts, at both the national and international levels, feel that if India wants to become a sporting nation, the country will have to invest heavily in building modern infrastructure and a robust grassroots system.
• Non-uniform policy-making:
  • The existing framework of sports governance consists of a federated model wherein a particular geographical location has its own autonomous bodies for governing different sports. In addition to this, there are national governing bodies such as BCCI, Hockey India, All India Tennis Association, etc.
  • These national governing bodies further have the responsibility of governing the State associations of every state on behalf of their members.
  • Even though there are national bodies for governance, the State authorities are the primary rule makers and there is no single policy or law laid down that they need to abide by.
  • This leads to arbitrariness and a lack of uniformity in the country with respect to the training given, the investments made and the roles and responsibilities within the organization, among other things.

Need for a new model of governance:

• The current model of governance of Indian sports clearly lacks accountability and transparency, which creates an environment that is conducive to wide-scale corruption, threatening a tournament’s overall credibility.
• Even India’s most profitable sports league, the IPL, despite being one of the better-managed Indian professional leagues, has been embroiled in controversy in the recent past.
• Hence, unless mechanisms are brought in place to govern the huge sums of money and the interests of various stakeholders, such tournaments will always run the risk of losing credibility, negatively impacting the future of its players and stakeholders.

India as a training hub for sports:

• The government routinely spends a lot of money on training people abroad and hiring foreign coaches.
• While the exposure of players to tournaments abroad is a very good idea, India could also consider the benefits of becoming a training hub for sportspersons from different parts of the world.
• For example, in cricket India can, with a little effort, become the sought-after destination for training global talent.
• India can develop such facilities in chess, shooting, badminton, and hockey to start with.
• This will have a salutary effect on sports in general and the people engaged in the specific sport in particular.

Conclusion:

• Commercialisation has certainly been a success factor, but a change in the culture of institutions that support sport is critical to move to the next level.
• Former sportspersons can take charge of guiding, mentoring, and even running federations if not completely, then at least on an equal footing with the bureaucrats.
• Bureaucrats are essential to administration in India, but for the nuances of sports governance, it is best to involve the experts extensively.
• The Central Government might have to play an intervening role to inculcate a better sports culture and create a conducive environment for the elimination of corruption and threat to the credibility of sports.

Source: The Indian Express

Mains Question:

Q. What are the problems with sports governance in India? Suggest some measures for ways to strengthen sports governance that will assist India in ensuring a permanent spot on the world sports map.