The Union sports ministry and many national federations have been keen on restarting sporting activities across the country and some of them have even been talking about the possible guidelines that can be followed once the restrictions are lifted.
But one wonders whether starting activities without giving enough thought to the India-specific challenges that those handling these facilities are likely to face is a good idea.
All sports activities have been suspended since March 24 in India and there has been pressure to restart from many quarters despite sports minister Kiren Rijiju making it clear that all training facilities will open only after lockdown is lifted.
However, the ministry recently began the process of creating a Standard Operating Procedure to restart activities and asked the National Sports Federations for their suggestions. But even they were surprised when the Swimming Federation of India forwarded them USA’s eight-page document titled ‘USA Swimming: Facility re-opening, messaging and planning’ instead of making an India-specific document, according to a report in The Indian Express.
SFI Executive Director Virendra Nanavati even defended forwarding the document instead of making a comprehensive plan focused on Indian facilities while talking to the paper.
“The guidelines issued by USA Swimming are foolproof and, to start with, we can rely on that. They have proper expertise in this area so we have forwarded that to the SAI committee. Let them modify as per the central and state government guidelines for Covid-19.”
Nanavati’s point is that the federations do not have any idea about the policies central and state governments would adopt after the lockdown in India and hence it was better for the ministry to modify the USA swimming recommendations to suit Indian needs.
The report said that the sports ministry had an online meeting with SFI and has asked the federation to modify the recommendations to make them relevant to Indian needs.
