Delhi: Sports need a revamp in India. Traditionally, sports have never been an integrated part of the Indian education system in general. We can easily see in every school that Physical Training classes were replaced by the science or maths class under the pretext of “syllabus completion”. However, the inclusion of sports in the syllabus is just for the sake of formality, said experts.
Experts were expressing their views in a webinar organised by the Indian Pierre De Coubertin Association (IPCA), a nodal national entity with international recognition assigned for the dissemination of Olympic Education & Olympism into the grassroots of Indian Sports. The First International Webinar was organised on the eve of World Sports Journalist Day On Thursday.
“Sports play a vital role in making children strong from inside while inculcating the importance of maintaining a fit and sound body. It helps in the development of focus and concentration, in-turn assists during studies,” said an expert.
Sports education directly impacts on maintaining the children’s well-being as well as increasing their physical stamina. It helps in developing muscle memory, strength, and overall bodily coordination, he said adding “Sports Education is a prevalent misconception that sports only helps towards physical development. It teaches many life skills including team spirit and coordination.”
A well-played game has the power of instilling such values like self-motivating spirit, discipline, leadership, taking ownership of success as well as failures, said the expert.
Speaking on the occasion, Chief Guest Elvira Ramini, Secretary-General of International Pierre De Coubertin Committee (CIPC), a unit of apex International Olympic Committee (IOC) said, there is a “very symbiotic relationship” between the media and sports. In modern society, sport and media seek inseparably a relationship where both exercise endless and continuous influence.
Media generates profit through sports while sports and its contents are transmitted through media. It is clear sports and media is developing in and expanding through this symbiotic relationship, she said.
This interdependent phenomena and symbiotic relationship can be referred to as sports media. Sports media can be conceptualized as a sports phenomenon by mediated sports contents intermediation. Media can be referred to all the mediums such as TV, Radio, newspaper, magazines, internet etc., which delivers sports information, scenes of sports events and any other related contents.
The combination of sports a media brings a variety of changes and influence to the modern society, she said.
Beside her encouraging speech, Elvira witnessed the entire event passionately. She emphasised the importance of Olympic Education in modern sports and also praised the works being performed by the Indian unit of IPCA.
The Special Guest from the Asian body of AIPS S. Sabanayakan Vice President of World Sports Press Association (AIPS), Asian Continental Zone. detailed the role of sports journalism towards the promotion of sports and minutely elaborated the duties and responsibilities of a sports journalist.
Speaking over the recent developments in the areas of sports, particularly the Sports Journalism, Sabanayakan said it is an area of numerous opportunities for the young generation and wished that more youth will opt for Sports Journalism in near future.
Speaking on the occasion Ajay Kukreti, a senior sports journalist with vibrant ideas interacted with the mass and also pointed out important tips for the different stakeholders of sports.
The first women Hockey Olympian from Jharkhand, Nikky Pradhan and International ace Athlete Sapna Kumari shared their experience and motivated all and also obliged with their feelings towards Sports Journalists.
Briefing on IPCA and the magnitude of sports, Jaideep Sarkar vividly briefed that even at this crucial stage of Corona pandemic across the world, sports & physical activities may play a catalytic role to improve the immune system of the human body which can not be leveraged by any means.
Jaideep is an Executive Board Member of Indian Pierre de Coubertin Association (IPCA) and National Council of Sports Science and Physical Education (NCSPE). He is also a City Officer of India’s first IOC supported Global Active Partner and an Asian Silver Medal (AVC) recipient in Volleyball based at Bokaro Steel City.
Meanwhile, the first-ever programme, that too during the COVID-19 days, passed a nice message of collaborative efforts and the authorities have also shown keen interest to partner with analogous entities for a better sporting yield apart from a green signal for the constitution of a recognised state unit of sports journalists in Jharkhand.
The event was attended IPCA board members comprising of its Secretary-General Sarojini Lakra, Executive Board members Shivendra Nath Dubey, Gyan Singh, Jaideep Sarkar and Dr Umakant Singh were present from the organisers’ side as speakers, host as well as an anchor.
The significant programme was commendably conducted by Dr Umakant Singh, Rajshree Prasad from Doordarshan, Norzom Bhutia of LNIPE, Gwalior.
EoM