Sports and games form an essential part of human resource development. Government of India attaches utmost importance to sports for development and sports for excellence. It has been the endeavor of the Government to lay down procedures for effective coordination among various agencies involved in the promotion of sports and extend required infrastructure, training and other facilities to 3 the sportspersons for achieving excellence in the international events.
Over the years a number of Nationals Sports Federations (NSFs) have come up for development of specific games/ sports disciplines. Government of India has been actively supporting these Federations in achieving their objectives.
Guidelines of 2001 laid down the following principles, which now stand subsumed in the National Sports Development Code of India (NSCI) 2011:
- A clear role dileanation between NSFs, SAI and the Government.
- Grouping of sport disciplines into ―priority‖, ―general‖ and ―others‖ for the purpose of determing the entitlement for government assistance.
- Detailed guidelines for preparation of Long Term Development Plans (4-year cycle). Provision made for annual sanction budgets of development plans.
- Binding tripartite agreements between NSFs, the Department and the SAI to be drawn up.
- An emphasis on professionalizing and upgrading the administrative and financial management of Federations.
- An emphasis on systems to handle players‘ grievance.
- The appointment of registered chartered accountants to ensure maintenance of proper and transparent accounts.
- Recognition of the role of sports promoters, particularly in event management.
The abovementioned guidelines are aimed at promoting good governance among NSFs as a means to strengthening their autonomy for discharging their functions and duties in accordance with the Olympic Charter and the basic principles and rules that govern the Olympic movement, and in the interest of sports development at large and the athletes’ welfare in particular.
It is noted with satisfaction that a large number of federations have already adopted or communicated their intent to adopt the good governance principles communicated by the Government from time to time. These include federations responsible for major sports disciplines such as Athletics, Badminton, Boxing, Golf, Hockey, Gymnastics, Rowing, Shooting, Tennis, Volleyball, Weightlifting and Yachting.
Since the primary intent of the National Sports Development Code is developmental in nature, the scales of the assistance for preparation of national teams up to 2012 London Olympic have been kept at the same level that was adopted for 2010 CWG. Further, with a view to expediting the approval of proposals from and release of funds to NSFs, certain functions have been delegated to SAI. Further, the need for specialization in the coaching department, including need for scientific support, has been duly recognized by allowing need-based deployment of such personnel. The anomaly that was earlier prevalent wherein the monthly remuneration to national coaches of non-CWG disciplines was Rs.15,000/- as compared to Rs.50,000 for CWG disciplines has been removed by raising the monthly remuneration of national coaches across all disciplines to Rs.50,000. Further, deployment of Assistant Coaches on a need-based manner has also been allowed.
With a view to also supporting sports development activities undertaken by sports bodies other than NSFs, a provision has been made to enable government support tournaments and other activities promoted by such organizations.
Recognizing the importance of school and university sport, it has been decided to have special long terms plans for the federations dealing with school sports and university sports.
In order to have a long term focus on promotion of sports excellence, it has been decided to henceforth put in place a long-term plan for two Olympic cycle at a time, which would be subject to annual review. This would enable us to concentrate on both active national teams and the feeder level.
With a view to eradicating cheating in sports, detailed guidelines have been prescribed for preventing doping in sports and preventing age fraud in sports.
Provision has been made for supporting exchange programmes in order to strengthen international cooperation between India and other countries in the field of sports. Efforts will be made to enter into MoUs and agreements with a number of countries on mutual beneficial agenda.
The compilation of all existing instructions in the form of a single National Sports Development Code is expected will enable better compliance with the basic universal principles of good governance in sports, which would, in turn promote a strong sporting culture and sports excellence in the country.
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