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India is not confident about its sports future

The total prize money that Sindhu has won is close to Rs 14 crore so far. There will be more, of course. The bronze winner in wrestling, Sakhi Mallik, is richer by around Rs 5 crore.

P V Sindhu, who won the silver for shuttle badminton at the Rio Olympics, is coming back home to a lot of gold.
She hails from the undivided Andhra Pradesh. But now that AP is split into Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, both states are locked in an Olympian competetion to reward her.
Ironically, the smaller and poorer state, Telangana, has been leading so far in this rather generous fight. Telangana has promised Rs 5crore as reward in cash to Sindhu.
AP could answer only with Rs 3 crore.
Other states have chipped in, too. Who said India is a penurious nation? Arvind Kejriwal's Delhi government has promised Rs 2 crore. Haryana has loosened its purse to the tune of Rs 50 lakhs.
Individual beneficence is also to the fore. Bollywood star Salman Khan would be issuing a cheque (and this one is not likely to bounce) of Rs 1.01 lakh. Not much, in these days of inflation; but Salman says he is giving that much to every member of the Indian squad that made it to Rio. The Central Government is yet to announce its reward scheme, which will no doubt better that of the state's.
The total prize money that Sindhu has won is close to Rs 14 crore so far. There will be more, of course. The bronze winner in wrestling, Sakhi Mallik, is richer by around Rs 5 crore.
All very good. The Rio medal winners richly deserve all they get. Some did not win medals, but are not the less for it. I have in mind, Deepa Karmakar, who was the first gymnast to have represented India in 52 years, and who reportedly practiced her difficult Produnova vault over a scooter parked in her backyard. She had finished fourth at Rio.
There are all very young - in their early 20s - daring women who had set their heart on a career in sports, because that's what they love. This is a dangerous thing in India to do. In the West, it's a given that you do in life what your heart tells you to. You can't chase perfection without passion. But in poor countries like India, you are generally advised to do what buys you three meals a day, a home, and a car. Medicine, Engineering, IT.
In India, the only sport that pays is cricket, which in my opinion, is a lazy man's game. Essentially, it's a Sunday sport, what with physically not very fit men ambling between creases, and those without bats watching for long what happens "out in the middle" and occasionally appealing to the umpire for justice.
The money in cricket is in thousands of crores. The BCCI, which officially represents cricket in India, is one of the richest sport bodies in the world.
Cricket is played by a handful nations. India, England, Sri Lanka, the West Indies, Bangladesh, Australia, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Pakistan, New Zealand. There may be a few others, but they do not much matter either in terms of viewership or talent. Nevertheless, even among this small clutch of nations, India is not exactly a champion cricketing power for all the noise and money it invests the sport with. The number of times India has made it to the top in big tournaments is pitifully small.
Sindhu, Sakshi Mallik and Dipa Karmakar chase a dream in a nightmare of neglect in the long neon-lit night of Indian cricket. That they are women add to their odds. Yet, they have salvaged some pride for a country that has an opinion on everything, and little to show for it in the wide, big world of sport. The general punditry and the flaunted superiority do not translate to proportionate achievement. Had the Rs 19-odd crore that collectively Sindhu and Sakshi Malik are about to get been actually pumped into their lives and training at a young age, all these great women would have probably won the gold. The investments in their talents should be ideally preceding the results.
Clearly, money is not the problem. All the cash awards have been declared overnight. It's a lack of will and, equally, a lack of vision that stand in the way of Indian sport.
The government - and not just the present one led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi -  just has no idea what to do with people who run and jump.
In short, India is not confident about its sports future. If it did, there would be more gold medals hanging from its people's necks. The unhappy fact is that Indians do not respect athletes. It's a nation that does not know how to relate to the body's need to be faster, higher, longer.
Why, is a good question to ask. And the short answer is: the pursuit of excellence come in many forms, and that sports is one such. The rather Brahminical tradition of scholarship-- the widening of the mind-- is best broken, because it is at the expense of the body. It's a tradition rather peculiar to the caste system of India. Consider the great number of people who Googled Sindhu's caste after she won the silver.
In any case, pursuit in perfection in running or playing badminton or vaulting over a bar, is a form of art that takes as many years, if not more, than studying for medicine or engineering. That there is not much much money in it, as Deepa would corroborate, just makes choosing that career suicidal in its prospects.
Sports bodies like the  BCCI can help. In 2011-2012 alone the BCCI earned a profit of close to $50 million. Admittedly, the BCCI funds sports activities besides that of cricket. It's just not enough though. Nothing prevents them from setting up a talent scouting team, and adopting boys and girls, not just in terms of training, but also in helping their families with a measure of financial security so important in the pursuit of excellence in anything.
My hero in Rio, apart from Usain Bolt of course, is Dipa Karmakar. If that old scooter on which she practiced her flying, body-tearing turns could talk, we will all be holding a kerchief to our eyes.
The author is a senior journalist and poet