The Lusofonia Games were intended to be a benchmark sporting event in the history of Goa, even as the allegations and controversies, which surfaced in the run-up to the games, were far from savoury and quite uninspiring to the participating athletes. The games exposed that we are yet to attain the class in organization of international sports events, like China did at the Olympics, with even the opening and closing ceremonies making us blush, thanks to the event manager’s poor showing.
Many infrastructure works including roads, parking around stadia did not meet the deadlines and are still incomplete, and the sports infrastructure barely made it by a hair’s breath. This infrastructure, though belated for a sporting State, was the best the State has thus far seen by any standards.
The Bambolim Athletics stadium is the first integrated athletic complex in Goa which is constructed according to IAAF specifications and norms with synthetic tracks. Its arena has facilities for track and field and athletic throwing events. The inner area of the track is covered with natural turf which can also be used as a football ground, besides floodlights worth crores. The Multipurpose Indoor Stadium at Peddem used for Judo, Wushu, Table Tennis and Taekwando Competitions during the Games, was not seen in Goa. The international standards indoor stadium at Taleigao Plateau can accommodate any indoor sporting event played at the Olympics, including volleyball and basketball matches with a seating capacity of 4000. Similarly, the Tilak Maidan which hosted Lusofonia football matches and Nehru Stadium which hosted football matches and games opening and closing ceremonies, were given costly facelifts.
The entire infrastructural work cost Rs 270 crore. However, months after the Lusofonia games are over, this massive investment including costly equipment, which should have been grabbed with both hands for optimum utilization by the Sports Authority of Goa and the Directorate of Sports, lies almost unutilized. To any sports watcher, it appears that both the sports mentors are completely short of ideas to utilize the stadia, caught up as administrators in bureaucratic wrangles. After the Lusofonia Games, the sports department and SAG, both have no publicly declared plan in place to utilise the government’s gift to them and to the people of Goa, to breed athletes and professional sportspersons. For the most part, these stadia have been locked with only the Bihari or Orissa security guards priding on the prime real estate infrastructure with just an event or two organized therein.
The only stadia that have been used are the Duler artificial turf FIFA certified football stadium, the Tilak Maidan and Jawaharlal Nehru stadium at Fatorda due to private initiatives. The Duler stadium has the Pro League which is presently on due to initiative of the Goa Football Association. The Tilak Maidan has been hired by the Football Club Goa for its training sessions, ahead of the Indian Super League and the Fatorda Stadium will host the I-league. But no event has been held at the Fatorda Stadium since the Lusofonia games and just one event has been held at the Bambolim Athletics stadium that too a non professional youth football training camp organized by Goa Football Development Corporation. The Taleigao Indoor stadium is sought to be used for non sports events including shopping festivals and political meetings, as also the Bambolim stadium. What deters the few users is reportedly the high fees charged by the SAG.
Shockingly equipment which was brought from China for holding the sport of Wushu during the Lusofonia games and for which the Goa government paid Rs 2 lakh for customs clearance and over Rs 2 lakh for installation and travel of experts from China, has now been taken to a private school called Godwin in Meerut. The lading bill of the Indian Customs clearly shows it was meant for Goa and Customs reportedly are filing recovery proceedings against the school.
It is time the Sports Minister, SAG and the Directorate of Sports woke up from their bureaucratic slumber and draft a comprehensive plan for the utilization of the facilities to produce professional sportspersons and athletes, by involving all the clubs, village youth, sports associations, schools and colleges, to get the stadia buzzing to create a sports culture in the state. Despite the surge of recent sports talent in swimming, chess, football, it is seen that often Goa prides on its past for many sporting events including hockey and athletics where it produced Olympians. It should be the endeavour of sporting bodies –whether government or private associations to get the present generation of students, often hooked on to cellphones, Facebook and television, onto the playing field and sweat it not only to bring laurels to the State, but create a sustained sports culture and more importantly create generations of healthy and fit individuals, who do not have to run on personal treadmills at home or sweat it out at gyms.
