Thursday, August 04, 2005
Remember Kutraleswaran?
About 10 years back this guy was making waves and hitting the headlines for breaking one record after other in long distance swimming. Youngest to cross the Palk Strait and the English Channel, every paper, magazine and tabloid from Kumudam to India Today was full of this young prodigy. And then suddenly he quite literarily dropped off the radar. I have always wondered why this guy disappeared,though I kind of guessed.
Metro Plus, published an interview with Kutral.He is 23 and doing his higher education abroad. He retired from swimming a few years back. He spoke of how inadequate sponsorship had forced him to qwit. I felt really sad when I read it. I mean this guy had what it takes to become the best in marathon swimming and in the 1500 m category in the Olympics. Though he said that he had no regrets I could sense his underlying hurt at being let down.
Sportspersons are special people. They bring great honor and pride to a country. And countries like U.S.A and Australia take it up as a national duty to ensure that they have the facility and infrastructure to support their career. Even impoverished African nations somehow manage to give at least rudimentary backing to their sports stars. Apart from pampering our overrated and highly spoilt cricketers what has the Indian State done about backing our sporting hero’s? In fact the support has been almost nonexsistant, so much so that we don’t have any sporting hero’s any more!
You might point out that Sania Mirza’s rise in tennis has been meteoric and I don’t want to undervalue her contribution to tennis in our country. But I can’t help but point out that she hails from an affluent family and had parents able and willing to finance her. If you happen to be a middleclass boy from Madras like Kutraleshwaran what do you do? Give up, hang your boots and seek another career. Which is exactly what he did.
The government seems keen to bid for the 2016 Summer Olympics. I hope that we don’t get to host it. We will make colossal fools of ourselves if we do. I suggest that the state first starts providing the platform where sportspersons are nurtured, and not driven to retirement before their career has even begun, as happened with Kutral.
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11 comments:
U R absoultely right, man.
See,China. They are developing so much of talents for each & every sporting events. They provide the platforms and know how to generate interest among the youth, eventhough it is a communist regime.
lack of facilities leads to lack of motivation among our youth.. which is one of the area, need to be developed afresh. otherwise, for every sporting event we will elate even if we get one medal (bronze!!!). That's a pity
Well the commies have always been good at producing sportsmen and women. Like how the East Germans and the Soviets used to pump their athletes with a lot of stuff that messed up their heads and genders and all that.
Yeah I think the state should take greater itnerest in other sports other than cricket, but then you could argue that cricket in India has come so far because of private rather than state funding - eg MRF Pace foundation. For their part, I think the state tries to do it's bit by giving out sports quotas in colleges and all , but why do parents want their kids to play cricket and not hockey ? Because cricket is where the money is - that's where Pepsi and Coke and Zandu Balm all go. Other sports have to be content with Lifebuoy or Memory Plus.
I think cricket is a game that we indians took to well , and so theres a lot of private money in the sports - the other sports that we've done well in - chess, or cue sports for instance, dont' really need too much state support , and I don't think Indians care enough about football.
I'm a little surprised why Hockey isn't so hot anymore - it used to be a long time ago. I think it still is in the north...
Nice post man. Yea, it is either the sponsor problem or parents would want their wards to "concentrate" on studies..
incidentally, my cousin's son is doing pretty well in swimming. lets hope he comes up well..
Lol, Kutral used to be my chat friend...used to have a lot of fun bugging him about his celebrity status :))
2016 OLympics? Like you said..me too...I hope it doesn't work out. We need the money to be spent on other good issues like sponsoring the athletes..etc.!
Kutraleeswaran - sad case. I know that he is in the US studying. Someone wrote about it. And believe me..with training here in the US..one day he might still swim under the INdian banner.. and win a medal..who knows.!
Don't ya worry there's no way India will even stand a chance in the Olympics bidding.One look at the facilities here is itself a major turnoff.Apart from Kutraleeshwaran,at the same time in India 10 yrs back there were a couple of other swimmers(forgot the names) who also swam the Palk Strait and the future looked bright.My dad did a story on both of them.I guess they faded away due to no fault of their own..same old story.I wonder where Nisha Millet's career is headed now.She's probably the only national swimmer in the news.
Sidd sport is big business world wide which takes big money. That's a fact of life sad to say.
Why is cricket a mad craze in our country that other sports are neglected??
Similar post by me
What happened to Kutral is bad. I remember that he was a student in my school. We were all very proud of him. He was showered with accolades. Coming from the same school, it pains me to see such a fine talent wasted.
Hi guys .. its really nice to see that so many of you really care for sports and for me .. trust me its moving ! Things would def be a lot different if the same mentality was shared by the majority.
well ..having stated that .. I would like to bring up a point for discussion ..
we all think other sports doesn get what it deserves .. and the most famous 'show catchers' being.. obv CRICKET !
Assume theres a live telecast of a cricket game involving India (however trivial the match is ) and theres a parallel telecast of a marathon swimming race .. what would you guys prefer to watch ? frankly .. I would surely pitch in for cricket !! because I am an ardent fan of the game .. just like the millions in our country !
So who do u think the private companies would like to sponsor ? Cricket .. or swimming .. where would they get back their investment in terms of advertisements ? in cricket or in marathon swimming ? :) and the government .. did help me for one whole year .... cant blame them too with our ever 'defecit' budget :) so who do we blame ? ourselves ? whats the solution to this ? ny takers ? :)
-Kutral
A biggg Hiii to eshwar and brownie :)
-Kutral
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