Essay on “Indian Sports” Complete Essay for Class 10, Class 12 and Graduation and other classes.

Indian Sports

Sports are good for any nation. Various games are played in India. India has excelled in few games and failed in various other games. Our individual performances are outstanding in some games but lack of team work can be seen at various sports. Proper sports policy could have helped in doing better performances at Olympics and Asiads. Poor performances are also due to lack of infrastructural facilities. In the last 50 years, the government’s role has not been quire upto the mark. A country of 90 crore people fails miserably at important world sports events like World Cups, Olympics, Asiads, etc.

In hockey, India had Dhyanchand popularly known as hockey wizard and late K.D. Singh Baby who brought laurels to the country by winning hockey golds at Olympics. But we could nor prolong their legacies of performing the best. Later on India fell far behind because it emphasized on dribbling. Throughout the field the game was excellent but when it came to scoring a goal, it used to remain a distant reality. The grounds in subsequent years became technologically improved like Astro turf. It took India a lot of time to catch up on these grounds due to lack of infrastructure and such grounds on home. Moreover, killer instinct to score a goal was also lacking on various occasions. That is why Germany, Australia and even Pakistan are able to perform better than India. Similar is the condition with football, the most popular game. India’s performance is so dismal that we are not even able to qualify for the World Cup Soccer Tournaments held every four years.

In athletics again, India’s performance has been poor. The largest team goes to the Olympics and comes without winning any medal. In the last fifty years India had not got any gold medal. In 1984, P.T. Usha, the sprint queen remained away from winning a bronze medal in hurdles race by fraction of a second, though she did outstanding performance by winning few golds at Asiads. We also had good performance by Milkha Singh, the flying Sikh of India. Again we are lacking in Javelin and Discus throws. Limba Ram showed outstanding performances at Archery championship but he is not consistent.

The reasons for poor performance can be attributed to the non-availability of economic support to these sports persons. The conditions of some of our outstanding performers have been very depressing due to poverty. They were not given enough economic support to live a good life. This kills the motivation at the entry level to play and later on to excel. There has to be a support so that the players do not drop out when they are needed the most. Of course, the proper training and proper nutritions have to be provided at every level but they are not. Some improvements as regards to policies have been formulated as now they are suitably rewarded. But lot can be done. Various awards are given to outstanding sports persons like Arjun awards and Dronacharya awards to the coaches.

If we look at other sports like cricket and lawn tennis, India’s performance has been satisfactory and doing well. We have a strong cricket team. India won the World Cup in 1983 under the captainship of Kapil Dev. Kapil Dev holds the record of highest wicket taker in test cricket and S.M. Gavasker has highest test centuries in test cricket to his credit. India has produced world class spinner like Chandrashekhar and B.S. Bedi. In lawn tennis India has always played better than its potential in Davis Cup. It reached in the finals once. The contribution of Ramanathan Krishnan, Vijay Amritraj and Ramesh Krishnan are worth noticing. In recent years the duo of Laender Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi have brought remarkable success at world circuit and they are no. 4 in world ranking. Individually their ranking is far below but when they combine they produce wonders.

Similarly the country which invented the chess, i.e., India is getting its real glory in the hands of Vishwanathan Anand. He has defeated almost all the top world chess players like Karpov, Kasperov. He was the first Indian to get International Master title. Dibendu Barua[??] and Pravin Thipsay are alos doing better. On the Badminton front too Prakash Padukone brought laurels to the country by winning prestigious tournaments like All England Badminton Championship in 1980. He has also helped in improving the conditions for improving Badminton in India. The performances of Deep Chand and Rajeev Bagga have also shown a touch of class. India can do a lot on Table Tennis front. India has not been able to do better at international levels in Table Tennis. In another individual sports like Billiard, the names of Willion James, Michael Ferrera are still counted. In recent years Geet Sethi has been able to win major international tournaments. The reasons for doing good at individual and costly games has been better infrastructure and good monitory incentives. Lawn Tennis gives good amount of money and similarly is the case with Cricket. The big companies provide enough economic support through advertisement which are generally denied to traditional games like Hockey, Football and Athletics.

The policy makers have never given a serious thought to the advancement and popularization of sports. If proper infrastructure facilities and catching the young at right time could have taken place, there is no doubt that India could perform better. There has to be an integrated policy to link the sports to national and youth development because there are various advantages of sports. Sports help in balancing the physical and mental development. But most importantly, it inculcates sense of discipline and spirit of sportsmanship which is very vital for development of youth as well as nation. The conditions should be made favourable in such a way that more and more youngsters are motivated towards entering and excelling in sports.