Save hockey, pleads Pargat

M.S. Unnikrishnan

Former Indian captain, Olympian Pargat Singh, said Indian hockey was gasping for breath and it was time a ‘Save Hockey’ project, similar to the ‘Save Tiger’ campaign, was launched to rescue the game from extinction. He said a multiplicity of authority – Hockey India, Indian Hockey Federation, Sports Ministry and Sports Authority of India – egoistic officials and inaction by the concerned authorities was throttling the national game. “If something was not done urgently, hockey will fade into the pages of history”, he warned.

Pargat, who is chairman of Hockey India’s Development Committee, urged the Sports Ministry to formulate a special ‘National Game Code’, for the development of hockey in the country.

He threatened that he, along with hockey lovers, including Olympians and others, will sit on a hunger strike on the National Sports Day on August 29 at the Dhyan Chand National Stadium in Delhi, to fight for the cause of hockey and help it regain the pride and glory it once enjoyed. ‘Save the national game hockey – 100 days action plan’ will be the theme of his campaign.

He said he had met former Indian Hockey Federation president K.P.S. Gill, Sports Minister Ajay Maken and the Hockey India officials to find ways and means to improve Indian hockey, but so far nothing has worked. Pargat said Hockey India was ‘deaf and dumb’ and unless infighting was stopped among hockey officials and federations, Indian hockey will slip beyond redemption. He said the sixth-place finish at the Azlan Shah tournament, where India were defending champions along with Korea, was the ultimate insult to the game, and unless remedial steps were taken immediately, it would be difficult for India to qualify for the London Olympics 2012 (the qualifiers for which will be held in Delhi in February).

“We have very little time to prepare for the Olympic qualifiers, but so far nothing has been done to get a foreign coach, though I have had discussions with some coaches,” Pargat said. With the present set-up, he did not see India qualifying for the London Olympics. “There is total confusion.”

Asked whether the IOA and its acting president Vijay Kumar Malhotra were contacted to end the impasse on the hockey front, Pargat said tersely, “The IOA is part of the sports mafia!” But he was hopeful of reviving the game if the authorities co-operated to take the right initiatives without wasting time. He said he had given his suggestions for the revival of the game to Hockey India about six months ago, “but nothing has moved”. “Things are back to square one,” he said exasperatedly.

Pargat was also scathing about the IOA’s insistence of maintaining its autonomy “as while on the one hand, it was talking about autonomy but at the same time, it expects the Government to do the funding”.

He said the country was paying a heavy price for not developing a proper “coaching mechanism” which was affecting the growth of the game. He said former coach Jose Brasa, along with a few others, were on the radar in the country’s search for a new foreign coach, but time was slipping by, and something needed to be done urgently to start preparations for the Olympic qualifier. He said it was sad that good players like Sardara Singh and Sandeep Singh preferred club hockey to national duty as they were earning a few lakhs by playing abroad.

Pargat said the diversity of the country was also affecting a uniform playing method for hockey, and it was time these aspects were looked into while formulating a larger national canvas for the integrated development of the game at the national level.

“The tragedy of Indian hockey was that no one seems to take the responsibility, as everybody is trying to put the hat on another’s head,” he observed and urged the Supreme Court of India to take cognisance of the existence of two federations in the country, which cannot happen in any other country, and “sort out the mess” as he was speaking from his heart, despite the matter being sub-judice. “Otherwise, hockey will be history”, he cautioned.

Pargat said though India played aggressive hockey like Holland and Australia, a weak defence was the bane of the present team. “We played attacking hockey and scored in the World Cup (in Delhi) and the Asian Games, but we also conceded goals, which showed up our weak defence.”

He said the short-term plan was to qualify for the Olympic Games while the long-term goal should be to develop a strong team, with a national pool of around 200 players. The hockey pockets mainly comprise of Chandigarh, and other places in Punjab, Bangalore, Mumbai, Orissa, and the tribal areas of Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh. “If we could identify at least 30 talented players each from these pockets, we would have a good bank of players who could be trained to do duty for the country”, Pargat said. He was shocked to know that the country was not fielding the under-19 team for the Asian Championship, which was a strong signal that the death knell of the game was being sounded.