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The ongoing battle between the Sports Ministry and the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) over the limitation of tenure of sports leaders is going to be a historic chapter in modern sports.
This is a classic battle between the sovereignty of the Indian government and the notion of autonomy espoused by the Olympic Charter.
Sovereignty is the quality of having supreme, independent authority over a territory. The Indian Parliament comprising of the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha have every legal right to impose their authority in India.
They are also an autonomous in this regards, unlike a majority of the European countries that have ceded some of their rights as members of the European Union.
Autonomy is the ability to make your own decisions about what to do rather than being influenced by someone else or told what to do.
The IOA, despite being a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), cannot exist in India without being a legally registered body as required by the law of the land. The same goes to other National Sports Federations.
The question now arises whether the IOA and National Sports Federations enjoy absolute autonomy?
The answer to this is obvious.
The IOA may claim that they do not fall within the ambit of the judiciary or the legislation and that they are governed by the Olympic Charter. But the Charter does not grant them any legal right to operate in India.
The IOA and National Sports Federations do not enjoy complete autonomy and must work within the ambit of the law of the country, which is supreme.
The decision by the Sports Ministry to enforce a 35-year ruling on the limitation of the term of sports office bearers may have its pros and cons but it is still binding on all sports associations.
However, the reality is that many International Sports Federations including the IOC, have grown into huge financial giants and are behaving like sovereign countries on their own right.
And with sports being an integral part of nation building, they do seem to have a stranglehold over many governments. In fact in the guise of autonomy to develop sports, they have usurped a fair bit of sovereignty of governments.
The obvious scenario is the threat of an IOC sanction on Indian sports and how this would bring sports in India to a standstill.
But sports would not be at a standstill because the IOC ruling would only affect multi-sports events like the Olympics and Asian Games.
The IOC banned Kuwait earlier this year, accusing the Kuwaiti government Kuwait for passing a measure that directly interfered with the autonomy of the country’s National Olympic Committee.
(The irony is that while the NOC has been suspended, the current president of the OCA, who is also a senior official of the Kuwait NOC, is still holding the president’s post in the OCA.)
Sports in general would not be affected by any such ruling to censure India made by the IOC.
Looking at India’s less than inspiring performances at the Beijing Olympics where they only managed one gold and two bronze, missing the next Olympics would not do much damage to India.
At the Doha Asian Games four years ago, Indian athletes won a mere 10 out of the 428 gold medals at stake.
Perhaps it is the right time to brush off the cobwebs and do some spring cleaning.
The issue between Kuwait and the IOC started in 2007 and it was not until January this year that the IOC exercised its powers and it is highly unlikely that the IOC would take any immediate action in the issue.
The IOC also knows its limitations and prefers to sort out problems in a more rationale way.
Can the Olympics be called a real global sports meet without the participation of the world’s second most populous country?
China withdrew its membership from the IOC in 1958 and did not make it back to the Olympics until the early 1980s. The long hiatus from the Olympics did not stop China from emerging as a major superpower in world sports.
The notion that the move by the Sports Ministry was ill timed and would affect India’s hosting of the Commonwealth Games this year would be badly affected is doomsaying.
There is no such thing as the right timing. If it is not the Commonwealth Games, than it would be the Asian Games or the South Asian Games or the Olympics. It is a never-ending story.
Limitation of tenure of office bearers in sports association is not an unthinkable idea.
The USA Track and Field Federation (USATF) for instance has in place an eight year term limitation that has worked well for decades.
The IOC itself limits the term of the presidency to 12 years.
Perhaps the most significant term limitation one can cite is the limitation of two four year terms for the USA Presidency.
In any decision there is always a flip side. If the decision to limit the term of office bearers has more upside to it, than the Sports Ministry should go ahead and stick to their guns.
Either way, it is going to be a momentous decision for sports in general.
