Saina, stop begging for awards
Saina Nehwal has started the New Year with a begging bowl in her hand. This is the off-season for badminton players and one would have expected the London Olympics bronze medallist to be focusing on her fitness at this point in time.
Instead, what one saw on Saturday was a sullen-faced Saina almost crying on television channels and showing herself in poor light by using Twitter to mouth her grievance at not being considered for the Padma Bhushan.
Over the years, almost every national award is riddled with some controversy or the other.
What makes it even more repulsive is that star athletes who have won laurels for the country come across as shameless. Awards should be seen as recognition. Instead, what has now become the norm is sportspersons knocking on the doors of the high and mighty, seeking awards and even managing recommendation letters from members of Parliament.
If you see the list of top athletes who have won the Padma awards, the names of Sunil Gavaskar, Kapil Dev, Rahul Dravid, Abhinav Bindra, Ramanathan Krishnan and Leander Paes find mention. Then again, champion shuttler Pullela Gopichand got the Padma Bhushan only in 2014 for his overall contribution to the sport.
Where Saina has lowered her image in the eyes of the public and fans is in asking that when star wrestler Sushil Kumar can be recommended for the Padma Bhushan this year, why should she be left out?
Hello, Saina, the Indian sporting fan knows you have an Olympic medal to show and had a good year on the circuit in 2014.
But where is the need to behave like a crybaby when there are so many years left in your playing career? The government conferred the Padma Shri on Saina in 2010, so there is no harm in waiting for a few years to get the Padma Bhushan.
Saina needs to flip through the Padma awards list and see how some athletes got the Padma Shri many years after their careers had ended.
As it were, Saina has been seen as someone craving attention. If sources are to be believed, last year she had asked for cash rewards from the Telangana government.
The shuttler is originally from Haryana, made Hyderabad her home base, where she trained under Gopichand, before moving to Bangalore to train under Vimal Kumar.
Very recently, Saina got land in Greater Noida from real estate magnate Gaursons for a badminton academy, which means she is getting her due in so many ways.
When an athlete takes to sport, the goal is to excel and move up the ladder step by step. If you are good enough to make the grade, your talent, backed by results, will be recognised.
If winning medals for the country is a dream come true, it should be the same when recognition comes from the government. Today, Saina has well wishers and critics on Twitter and they have wasted no time in expressing their feelings. As a national icon and role model, Saina needs to set high standards for the youth.
By crying for an award which has not come her way, Saina has shown how fragile she is. The bigger mistake she has made is to compare herself with Sushil, who stands head and shoulders above her by way of performances.
The grappler has won two Olympic medals — bronze and silver — from the Beijing and London Olympics respectively, which cannot be contested by anyone. At the macro level, this whole process of applying for an award needs to be done away with. Let’s take a look at the Bharat Ratna. Former India Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee or cricketing icon Sachin Tendulkar never applied for it.
In an ideal situation, when it comes to sportspersons seeking Padma awards, there has to be a proper vetting process. If you can have committees for the Arjuna, Dronacharya and Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna awards, have something similar for the Padma Shri, Padma Bhushan and Padma Vibhushan. The government list mentions Viswanathan Anand and Tendulkar as the only two sportspersons to have been bestowed the Padma Vibhushan in 2007 and 2008 respectively. Saina is perhaps not aware that some of the legends of Indian hockey never got even an Arjuna Award in their time. Only much later were they given the Dhyan Chand Award for Lifetime Achievement.
It is well known that sportspersons coming from poor economic backgrounds crave for the Arjuna as it carries a cash component as well and free rail travel by AC class for a lifetime.
Saina needs to cherish her own achievements and focus on what she can go on to win in the New Year. Tobe caught in the negativity of not being chosen for a national award does no good to any athlete’s aura.