Fall in CWG spot

If Parupalli Kashyap broke a 32-year jinx to claim the men’s singles badminton gold, Vikas Gowda has entered the league of Milkha Singh after 56 years in the mother of all sports, the athletics men event as a gold medallist at the 20th Glasgow Commonwealth Games (CWG).

But the Glasgow CWG has been an eyeopener. England (172) has nearly three times the medals and Australia (136) has more than double that of India. Interestingly, England has 20 times less population than India and in India, Haryana with less than 2 per cent of the Indian population has brought 30 per cent of the medals. Why do the England or Haryana models succeed in sports and why the much-hyped developed Gujarat remains almost zero in sports and games is a matter of debate.

In the Delhi CWG, India were at the second position with 100 medals, including 38 gold, and this time we bagged only 64 medals, including 15 gold. Is it not a big fall? In 2006, we were at eh fourth spot with 22 golds. For good performance, the government should put more money in sports and also improve infrastructure and training standards.

Bidyut Kumar Chatterjee, Faridabad

Telecast wrestling

Rajwinder Kaur won a bronze medal in wrestling in the Commonwealth Games at Glasgow. She defeated a 55 kg heavier and stronger Esther Akinyi Ratugi of Kenya. It is noteworthy how she mustered determination to defeat the mighty opponent. She is our national pride. The government should telecast the event on the national network repeatedly to boost the morale of young players and athletes.

GS Sidhu, Mohali

Sports a unifier

Ours is a country of vast diversity. Communal remarks of political leaders of various parties is a matter of concern. A recent remark made by a BJP leader, criticising the decision to appoint tennis player Sania Mirza as brand ambassador of Telangana is deplorable. In the just-concluded Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, I noticed that in the badminton match, two Chinese native players with an Indian coach were representing Canada. Was there any prejudice in that country? Such countries are winning more medals because they recognise a person by his talent not by caste or religion. India must provide basic facilities to sports individuals, irrespective of their caste. The politicians need to disengage themselves from sports-related matters. Sports is the only track for the unification of society.

Gurpreet Singh, via email

Bias hits Punjab sports

Apropos the news story on Punjab lagging behind Haryana in the Commonwealth Games, it is pointed out that Punjab lags behind Haryana in prize money too. This is true because of Punjab's financial crisis.

My contention is that whatever Punjab spends on the promotion of sports suffers from an ugly regional bias. Instead of spending money on creating infrastructure for sports in the districts with traditional sporting culture, Punjab is spending most of its resources in the Bathinda-Badal belt. Badal village, which has rarely produced an international level player, has an expensive world class astroturf for hockey and a state-of-the-art shooting range. On the other hand, the districts of Gurdaspur, Amritsar, Tarn Taran, Hoshiarpur, Jalandhar and Kapurthala, which boast of several great athletes, have received no facilities from the Punjab Government in recent years. Even Guru Nanak Dev University, which has dominated the inter-university athletics for four decades, did not get a synthetic Olympic specification athletic track. Such misplaced priorities have hit sports in Punjab. And there are no high paying jobs in Punjab. Hope the government wakes up to the need of the hour.