Ever notice our Olympic sports stars popping up these days in key committees everywhere?
In the last eight months, Olympian Number One Abhinav Bindra must have been through more committee meetings than he has in his entire life. In August 2016, Bindra was named on the National Rifle Association of India's review committee to examine the Indian shooting contingent's no-show on the Rio medal podium.
In early January, he was added on the committee suddenly created to produce a "comprehensive" National Sports Development Code across sport, with the task of offering within a month a new and improved version of what was already in existence.
In the last week of January, Bindra was named by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sport (forever enshrined in the unfortunate acronym MYAS) to its re-constituted Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS) panel to identify talent for the 2020 to 2024 Olympic Games. Three days later, the ministry announced his name on the Prime Minister's Task Force to set up a detailed "action plan" for the next three Olympic Games.
Then within the next two months, MYAS released a list of "observers" who were to act as the ministry's "eyes and ears" and keep a watch on the national sports federations of India's "high-priority" disciplines. Bindra was the shooting representative, Anju Bobby George (who was also on the NSDF committee) and PT Usha for athletics, and Karnam Malleswari (who is also on the TOPS committee) for weightlifting, among other big names.
Bindra is in fine company in this rash of committees - Prakash Padukone, Viren Rasquinha, Pullela Gopichand, Akhil Kumar, IM Vijayan, MC Mary Kom, Jagbir Singh, Aparna Popat, Khazan Singh, Anjali Bhagwat all find themselves on one or more of the panels set up over the past few months. The Ministry's outreach to former athletes may appear to be an attempt at egalitarianism and inclusion as well as the understanding that the athlete's voice will be an important part in sports governance of the future.
Yet, there is quite a bit going on in between the lines.
Often, an athlete's name is mentioned on a committee even before his or her consent has been sought. (The TOPS and Task Force committees, for example, came as a surprise to a few). Once the announcement has been made, turning down the position could make athletes look bad.
In this post-Rio committee-epidemic, the announcement of the role of "observers" lies somewhere between a loaded gun and a hot potato. Not because of the intention itself, but in the details. From the outside, their role appears to be more than just about their expertise or experience alone. Athletes are being asked to: report on selection committee meetings, study the quality of infrastructure, scientific and medical back-up, keep a database of select athletes and coaches, formulate long-term and annual activity plans, and at least a dozen more (see box). Never mind dreaming of superhero qualities in the athletes, it begs a sorry, solitary question - what's left for the Federations/the Ministry to do?
The MYAS list of observers was a salute to stalwarts across various disciplines; the scale of their duties and responsibilities in the announcement, however, make the exercise look like something of a stitch-up.
The observers will automatically become buffers in the usual fisticuffs between the Sports Ministry and national sports federations. Should matters come to a messy end, anonymous bureaucrats and administrators do not make for the most conspicuous targets or scapegoats; the famous athletes always do.
Within this formidable list lies a key rider: that 'each National Observer' would be given a 'specific area of activity' for which will they will be 'completely responsible and accountable' to the MYAS for their work. When spoken to, most of the athletes named observers had little clarity about their specific roles. Each observer brings a different personality and world-view to his sport and where he or she thinks they can contribute. It can only be hoped they are handed or have the freedom to ask for the activity they have an interest in and an aptitude for.
Bindra, it is clear, has an aptitude for planning and an understanding of policy. Think of his many committees as a crash course in Indian sports administration. By the time he is 40 (he's 34 now), imagine how much he would already know.