ChinmayC Blog

The Olympic games in Rio de Janeiro, August 6-21,2016, have come to a grand close today. We have no space here to cover all those terrific achievers from across the world. Therefore we will concentrate only on India, although it has been a disappointing tale. As usual, India sent the largest ever contingent to participate in various sports disciplines, but for eleven long days the country fumed and fretted for an elusive medal which was made worse by some negative vibes, comments and hiccups. However, four magnificent ladies from a largely patriarchal society came to the fore and the focus of concentrated attention giving the countrymen a rare opportunity to feel proud of them.  In Badminton expectations were mostly from Saina Nehwal, but she failed not even through to midway in the competition. And came PV Sindhu, not at all in contention for a medal, and fought like a tigress competing with players much much higher in world ranking. She set the ball of euphoria rolling by en...

The much awaited London Olympics-2012  starts tonight, the 27 th July with a grand opening ceremony planned in some amount of secrecy by the celebrated filmmaker Danny Boyle (famous in India for his controversial and yet Oscar winning movie The Slumdog Millionaire ). But in India the Olympics would actually start in the wee hours tomorrow, the 28 th of July. After a series of controversies concerning sponsorship, concerning India and concerning serious security issues the once-in-four-year mega World Event is finally going to unfold in all its grandeur. India is very big country, but its presence in the Olympics has always been little—in terms of medals won particularly Gold medals. This is unfortunate and is mainly the result of a commercial approach to sports with sponsors coming  forward to put money in only money-spinning games like cricket. The government’s policy has been lukewarm too with a lot of former or promising athletes rotting in uninhabitable environs or in un...

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) held a crucial meeting today in Mumbai and banned five domestic cricket players found guilty of corruption or indulgence in spot fixing. BCCI’s new anti-corruption Unit gave its report to the disciplinary committee and after deliberations in the meet the decisions were taken. The five players were charged with varying degrees of culpability to negotiating or bargaining for money for spot fixing in domestic cricket matches and to loose talk or bragging bringing the game of cricket into disrepute. TP Sudhindra , the chief offender, was banned for life while Shalabh Srivastava was banned for five years. The other three namely Mohnish Mishra , Amit Yadav and Abhinav Bali , charged with lesser offence, were banned for one year each. These players were notionally suspended on May 15, 2012 after a television news channel sting operation exposed their involvement in spot fixing. The BCCI verdict has been hailed as a tough measure to crack corru...

Sania Mirza, the No.1 female tennis star of India, had been silent throughout the biggest Indian tennis fight as she was not guaranteed to participate in the London Olympics. The moment she got the wild card entry into the Olympics Sania got wild and justifiably so.  Sania Mirza attacked the All India Tennis Association (AITA) for using her as ‘bait’ to pacify and lure a disgruntled stalwart (read Leander Paes) to represent India in the London Olympics-2012. She interpreted AITA’s compromise as ‘an insult to womanhood’ and a decision that reeked of ‘male chauvinism’. She also alleged that the said compromise had broken up the French Open Grand Slam winning combination of herself with Mahesh Bhupathi in the mixed doubles. She also criticized Paes’s father for demanding a written assurance from her that she would pair only with Leander in the London Olympics mixed doubles. While expressing her anguish for such an unwarranted demand Sania said that she was committed to her country an...

We have always heard about the Indian cricketing superstars dictating terms to their controlling Board on when they need rest or which format of the game they need to play and so on. But what the Indian tennis players have been doing to their selectors would make the cricket superstars look like silly brats! Both sets of players show a common characteristic though—self interest first and the pride of the nation later. Leander Paes, the best international doubles tennis player for India, wanted the next best Indian to pair him so that the chances of getting an Olympic medal in London got maximized. The All India Tennis Association (AITA) toed his line from the very outset. But a crisis situation developed when the next best players—Mahesh Bhupathi—refused to play with Leander. The IATA then hooked up Rohan Bopanna, the next best seeded player, for pairing with Leander. But Bopanna also refused and agreed to play only with Bhupathi. The Indian Sports Ministry tried to intervene by sugge...

The duo of A and B has been most productive for India winning three doubles Grand Slams over the years of togetherness. They had been the best of friends too and many described them as husband-wife preferring to remain silent on who was the better half! But A and B fought…and fought bitterly in 2002 splitting up and going separate ways. They continued to team up and not ‘pair’ up for major international tournaments though. Maybe reaching an understanding about who was the better half they patched up and played as a pair for the Australian open in 2011. But they fought again just before the London Olympics and fought the bitterest ever . B does not want to be paired with A at any cost as B lost faith in A irreparably. Both of them want C as a partner. Now C loathes A and wants only to be paired with B. D—their father—pulled them up hard and stuck to what it thought the basic need of the hour . That A and B pair had been the best ever and the only real chance for Olympic honors. Coming ...