OLYMPIC MEDICAL

2016 summer Olympic medal table put USA on top with 46 Gold 37 Silver and 38 Bronze with a total of 121 medals followed by Britain 27, 23 and 17 with total of 67 and China on the third place with 26, 18 and 26 with a total of 70. India the second largest populated nation stands at the 67th position with no gold and one silver and bronze each. Why India cannot do what China can?

China stood  3rd in the medal rank in the 2000 Sydney,  2nd in the 2004 Athens, 1st in 2008 Beijing and 2nd in the total medall tally (3rd in gold tally) in 2012 London Olympics. In China kids are brought into playing different sports and are encouraged by their parents to take sports as a profession. The Chinese pick the children at the young age and give them adequate training and create a competitive spirit in them. They use their large population for a cut throat  competition to get selected in the national level. They are then provided special training to make them world beaters. The large pool of talent helped them to send a 416 member contingent to Rio in 2016 which could bag around 100 medals. This means that about 25% of the strength could win medals. India has sent 117 athletes in 15 sports and bagged one silver and one bronze.

All medal winning countries are sending their men and women to the Olympics after proper training. They all must have their bench marks for selection. We too have a grand  establishment of sports in our country. A sports ministry, too many sports organisations and training institutes at Central and State levels with all necessary facilities. We have a large talents to pick from too, but these are all not found to be enough to secure Olympics medals.

It is difficult to assume that Chinese sports personnel are beyond our reach. But it must be certain that the training imparted by them to the young children must be superior, efficient and disciplined. Yes, let us look at that way. We must pick up children at a young age. Provide them most advanced training in a disciplined manner. Sports trainees should be excluded from the conventional educational system. There should be a seperate syllabus for them and the duration of school should be slashed considerably. These children should be provided with best food and must be kept in good spirits. Now, on completion of the training they should be selected under a strict bench mark for the competition. That  bench mark must be the fourth position of the last Olympics. No one below this cut off line should be selected for any Olympic events. How many of us participate does not matter but how many medals we get should matter.

We may also take the help of large industrial establishments from private and public sector for training Olympic contestants.  Anyone promoted by any of these industries win Olympic medals the concerned firms should be given income tax concessions on percentage basis depending upon the type of medals their employees win. If this could be implemented there will be definite results.

Let us now perform better and earn more.

KV George

kvgeorgein@gmail.com