Rusted

              The journey from nadir to zenith/from being a novice to being a perfectionist/from being a stranger to a celebrity is tough but also pleasing and ends up giving you joy and fame. On the other hand, the journey from apex to bottom is even tougher and ends up giving you endless pain and dejection. Now that’s how life has panned out for so many talented sportsperson from Indian sports fraternity, not because they lost their talent somewhere in the middle but because the limelight was shifted from them as and when they grew old and with commercialization/advent of other sports.

      Indian hockey, which today is down in the pits, was once sabotaging the best of hockey teams all around the globe. After bagging 8 Olympic gold medals and 1 World Cup gold medal Indian hockey was hit by “the law of averages” and hence lost its way since 1982 Asian Games. Fine, we don’t want to give too much importance to our current hockey players/coaches because they are not performing well but what about those men who once travelled in trains, trained with low quality equipments/accessories but played out of their skins to take Indian Hockey to pinnacle of success. Today one would find them spending time with their family in an unfurnished hut in some village….running around to get their sons educated/employed….borrowing money to get their daughters’ married. Isn’t it shame on our sport ministry’s part that someone like Dhyan Chand, the hockey wizard, died of liver cancer in the general ward of AIIMS before a media story helped to have him shifted to a special room.

      Cricket had made its mark on its own merit and deserves all the accolades. But just like cricket, don’t we need to honour and remember the sportsperson who made us proud or are making us proud. Most of us would remember a Sourav Ganguly 183 in Taunton in 1999 world cup but do we still remember Karnam Malleswrari who won a bronze medal in 2000 Olympics for India in weight lifting. No one cares to talk of Makhan Singh, the sprinter who won gold at 1962 Asian Games. Today he has lost his legs in an accident and has received no financial aid from Indian Govt. We remember the Test match India lost to Pakistan in chennai in 1999 when the master scored a brave 136 with back spasms but we don’t talk of P.T.Usha who missed out on an Olympics medal by 1/1000^th of second.

            With due respect to Yuvraj Singh, who along with Zaheer Khan was the premier architect of India’s epochal World Cup win in 2011, has received help and good wishes from all expected & unexpected corners of the world for his cancer treatment but what of Jaspreet Kaur, the Kabaddi player, who hurt her spine during a tackle in 2001. 10 years later she got Rs. 1 lakh cheque from Punjab CM & now gets a pension of Rs. 10,000 per month.

      We must remember Vishwanathan Anand/Gagan Narang/Abhinav Bindra are as much a contributor to Indian Sports as is Sachin Tendulkar. They are all champions in their own fields. It’s just that their sporting arena are different. Cricket is the richest Indian sport today and hence is a household name and has commercialized itself brilliantly.

      Before I wrap it up, I would like to summarize the article with a dialogue from the movie Paan Singh Tomar…. “Jab tak desh ke liye daude….kisi ne nahi poocha. Aaj Baghi(dakait) ban gaye to sab pooch rahe hain...”. This statement highlights the fact that how the medals, fame, name…all get rusted with a passage of time.

Note: This article is inspired from a Tigmanshu Dhulia film “Paan Singh Tomar” and is dedicated to the unsung heroes of Indian Sports Fraternity. 

....@ Debashish