Let sports be sports

With the Asian Games (Asiad) in Guangzhou, China, fast approaching, most participating countries have already decided which games to participate in and how many athletes to send. However, Nepal’s story is different. With less than two weeks to the Games, we have not even decided officially how many games our athletes will be participating in due to the differences between National Sports Council (NSC) and Nepal Olympic Committee (NOC).



NSC, which has approved 15 games (swimming undecided yet), claims that only it has the authority to decide on how many games Nepal will participate in the Asiad whereas NOC, which has approved 20 games, claims that all sports bodies in Nepal are autonomous and if they want to participate in the games with their own money, NSC has no rights to object to it, let alone rights to punish the various bodies affiliated with NOC that are sending the athletes on their own expense.



However, the real reason behind the fallout between the two sporting bodies is a power struggle among the top officials of the bodies that have been going on since NSC, which is led by Sports Minister Ganesh Tiwari Nepali, dissolved the Nepal Gymnastics Association led by NOC President Dhruba Bahadur Pradhan in March. From that day onward, the two sporting bodies are trying to assert themselves in the Nepali sports arena. Needless to say, it is our athletes who are being severely affected by the whole episode.



At a time when both our southern and northern neighbors, India and China, held two mega events and did fantastically well in the medals tally, it is quite unfortunate that the sports bodies established to promote sports in our country are fighting among themselves. The sooner they realize that their actions have only led to demoralization of our athletes, who like their counterparts elsewhere in the world dream of representing Nepal in international competitions and make us proud, the better. It is indeed quite sad to note that sports, like everything else in the country, has become heavily politicized. People are appointed to sports bodies not based on their sportsmanship but based on their political connections.



However, it is still not too late to initiate reforms and come up with a sports policy clearly highlighting the roles and responsibilities of both NOC and NSC. The government should also make sure that the new policy tallies with the policy of other countries, and the international sports organizations that Nepal is a member of. It should also invest in the development of sports in the country. Then only will our athletes be happy and make us proud in international events. We urge the government to look into the present row between NOC and NSC that has put our athletes in a limbo, and also do all it can to prevent such rows in the future. Let sports be sports.

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