Athletics disaster & hockey magnified failure

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Sydney: This is a chronicle of a disaster foretold. A chronicle that sees a new edition every four years, but not very dissimilar from the one written four years earlier.

The athletes come and go, their results continue to be abysmal. Every now and then, the odd ones to stand out in isolation, while the rest are content are with the tag of being an Olympian.

They revel in the Olympic motto, which lays emphasis on participation, rather than medals. But nobody told the Indians that Baron Pierre de Coubertin, who is often credited with this said it almost a hundred years ago and it no longer has relevance in modern sport.

So much so, even the International Olympic Committee, prefers quality to quantity, which is why they keep trying to find ways of unearthing means and methods to restrict numbers.

Even as the critics are baying for their blood and crying themselves hoarse that fewer participants should have been brought to Sydney, the officials point out that all those came here had attained certain standards set by the world body.

The chef de mission, Ashok Kumar Mattoo maintains that each of the 73 sportspersons brought here had attained a certain standard set by the world body, or else the world body had given them a "wild card" or "hardship quota".

The Indian failure was magnified because of the Indian hockey team's inability to make the semi-finals and then the athletics contingent's disastrous performance.

No one really expected medals from all. Maybe from a few like women weightlifters - which they did through Karnam Malleswari - maybe a boxer or two, maybe the hockey team and maybe Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi. But the rest we all know are here to make up numbers.

Going to the Olympics is fine and for India to be represented is again fine. But what really became intolerable was the number of athletes who were sent and how poorly they performed.

In each of the disciplines, the international body themselves monitored the standards except in the case of athletics. The organisers rules allow each National Olympic Committee to send a token number (usually two, one male and one female) of athletes, even if they have not qualified.

But if the numbers are greater, the International Amateur Athletics Federation (IAAF) expects the National Federation to ensure that the athletes have attained standards set by the world body.

In most of the cases where the number of qualifications were in small numbers, the failures did not rankle half as much as the disaster in athletics. Two swimmers, three shooters, four boxers, one each in judo and wrestling, one rider, two rowers, three table tennis players and four tennis players.

Even when most of these failed, sometimes miserably, it could be tolerated by saying, after all we do need to give our boys and girls some exposure at the highest level, or at least there should be some representation. But what has been completely unpardonable has been the athletics contingent.

Of the total of 31 people sent by the AAFI, just one person, K M Beenamol, had any right to be there. The rest were a disgrace performing as much as five to 10 metres less in some events and some times were many seconds off what they clocked in India at the trials.

The Athletics Federation seemed to have gained some credibility with a fine performance at the Asian Games. This time by sending a contingent, which was almost as big, to Sydney, they had clearly committed suicide.

The disaster prompted most of the coaches and officials accompanying the team to maintain silence. "We will go back and look into the reasons, why the performance was lower than expected," commented chief coach, Bahadur Singh.

And at the same time, he sought to absolve himself and the Federation saying these athletes had attained qualifying standards and therefore had to be sent.

The manager of the contingent, A K Banerjee, also a senior office-bearer of the federation, was a little more forthcoming. "Some athletes did very badly and in the case we need to take action for why they did not even make any effort," he said.

But at the same time he refused to elaborate on which athelets "did not make any effort". Talking of qualifying standards, which the athletes are purported to have reached, how much do we trust what the Federation tell us or how valid are the marks attained by Indian athletes at home.

When you have a shotputter Shakti Singh throwing consistently over 20metres at home and then not going beyond 18.40m in Sydney or a Gurmeet Kaur who keeps coming close to 60 metres in javelin and then barely managing 52 metres in one throw and a disgraceful 46-48 metres in the rest, where will the AAFI mandarins hide their face.

The long jumper, Sanjay K Rai made one foul jump and then didn't take any more tries. The relay teams, the Paramjit Singhs, the Jagdish Bishnois and others, each one of them are to blame for the pathetic showing, but as much blame should be placed at the AAFI's door.

Performances in domestic meets no longer have credibility. The AAFI announced grandly that it would have dope tests at every meet. But are the dope tests being carried out properly? Are the coaches and doctors aware of what's happening or are they part of a large cover-up?

The AAFI has far too many questions to answer. These questions have been raised in the past, but now in the light of the monumental failure at Sydney they are bound to crop yet again.

The Indian athletes were never really expected to win medals, in fact they were not even expected to go beyond the first or second rounds. The AAFI ought to have realised the gulf between Indian athletes and the rest of the world, and restricted the numbers.

If only half a dozen had been sent and they had not performed well, they would have got hidden in the larger failure of the whole contingent. But when one sport forms almost 40 per cent of the contingent and fails miserably, the focus is too sharp on it.

And that's going to be the problem for AAFI president SureshKalmadi and the secretary Lalit Bhanot.

India Abroad News Service