Sports at schools is the backbone of sporting success of any country, lack of which is often attributed to the absence of sporting culture in our Indian society. One Thousand Hockey Legs (OTHL), a project of Delhi-based NGO, Hockey Citizen Group, seeks to address the issue in its unique way.
The NGO’s flagship project One Thousand hockey legs -- which seeks to introduce the game of hockey to at least 500 school kids every year, especially in schools where low profile and poor kids study -- came into limelight recently.
Shri Pranab Mukherjee, Hon’ble President of India, presented the NGO with the prestigious Rashtriya Khel Protsahan Puruskar 2016, on National Sports Day, where Rio gems PV Sindhu and Sakshi Malik were given away Khel Ratna.
The award was given for identifying and nurturing of young and budding talent. It is perhaps for the first time an NGO working in schools hockey promotion got the country’s top award.
When India failed to qualify for Olympics in 2008, IIT Bombay alumnus and sports writer, Mr. K. Arumugam started the NGO in 2008 after giving up his government job. Over the period of 8 years, OTHL has done several pioneering works in the field of hockey.
Besides providing hundreds of deprived underprivileged section of the society an opportunity to play hockey, it added lifestyle skills to them to make them count in the society. OTHL is currently in operation in five cities of India: Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Puducherry and Kanpur.
In Delhi alone, OTHL introduced 24 schools who now have well-established hockey teams and playgrounds for generations to play. In Kolkata where football and cricket take the cake, OTHL added about 12 schools. At present, it caters to about 4000 children in 80 schools.
OTHL provides free hockey kits, coaching and other required facilities for the kids to excel in the sport of hockey. It also gets types of equipment through donation. One such example is of Dutch goalie-legend Jaap Stockmann, who got the NGO about 40 goalkeeping kits, 300 hockey sticks etc.
The objectives of the NGO is career promotion; it doesn't retain the talent for the sake of NGO winning laurels but believes in sending the talent to deserving place. The ultimate goal is for the children to have a better life. About a dozen of its talents are thus practising in Sports Training Centres in various parts of India.
Recently, two of the OTHL boys got selected for the highly competitive National Hockey Academy. A total of 17 boys have joined STCs and few are studying in good private schools with scholarships and are part of their school's hockey team. Many of the OTHL players have played in the National Championships. In the year 2015 alone, OTHL introduced 5 new tournaments.
After receiving the award, founder and CEO, Mr. K. Arumugam said, " I feel this kind honour for humble and self-funded NGO will motivate every right kind of sports lovers to come forward and contribute. I dedicate this award to all those underprivileged kids whose enthusiasm to play motivated me to do something for them daily. Thanks also to all my volunteers."
OTHL is a volunteer based organization, welcomes volunteers and coaches to contribute to hockey and children’s development through this platform.
