The Hindu Business Line : Sport hysteria

MERY KOM needs a job. This 21-year-old Manipuri's story could be that of any young person in this country seeking employment. Only, Mery also happens to be a gold-medal winner for India, her second consecutive gold at the recent World Boxing Championships in Moscow.

Sport enthusiasts in the country can be forgiven if they do not know Mery Kom. Also for not tracking every move of chess grandmaster Koneru Humpy. Or for their hearts not racing as Anju Bobby George jumps to a gold at the recent Asian Athletic Championship at Incheon. In fact, Indian athletes brought home 13 medals from this Championship, including four by women.

These young women may win sport events in international arenas. But their stories rarely make it to front-pages, leave alone the cover of Time magazine. At best, these players get a write-up from the sports journalist covering the particular game, that usually finds space on the sports page. And rarely are they thronged by fans when they arrive in India with medals.

And therein lies the importance of catching media imagination. Cricket and cricketers, of course. And, now, Sania Mirza. This young woman gets the attention of deep-pocketed advertisers and the media, of course deservedly as her world ranking has improved dramatically after stagnating for a while. Yet, is the hysteria surrounding her justified? As one tennis legend said during her trip to India, tennis stars like Maria Sharapova have been winning tournaments at the same age. And so did Steffi Graf, Martina Hingis, the William sisters, to mention but a few tennis stars.

At the Athens Olympics, sport-lovers were told that shooter Anjali Bhagwat was a medal-probable. But who brought home a silver? A dark horse and a name not many had even heard of: Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore.

Unlike any other field, sport is as transparent as it gets. Either you perform or you don't. The statistics, the records and the achievements are there for even the most un-sporty person to read and understand. It is heartening to see cricket, sharing space with other sport. But the largely lopsided hype following sporting achievements is disconcerting. Why does winning a gold for the country not bring in the advertisers and the hysteria that go with it? Why are winners treated with indifference, while others get applauded even when they lose quite early on? Why are some sports and some sportspersons more equal than others? Like an engaging game of chess, it continues to puzzle why a gold-medal winner for the country, Mery Kom, needs to plead for a job.

P. T. Jyothi Datta

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