What’s the story?
Ace Indian shuttler Jwala Gutta was yet again at the receiving end of social media trolls over a naïve mistake she made. The Commonwealth Games gold medallist had taken to Twitter to express her disgust at Sports not getting a single mention at the Union Budget presentation by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. Quite obviously, she was unaware that the budget for Sports has indeed been hiked by Rs 351 crore.
Fanatics on the social networking platform, however, took her apart with many rebuking her for her mistake. A few others went on to mention how one needs to perform before making such statements and one person even compared her to former Indian cricket captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni.
In case you didn’t know…
The Union Budget was presented yesterday by Arun Jaitley in the parliament in New Delhi. Although the Sports Ministry received a substantial hike from Rs 1592 crore to Rs 1943 crore, no mention of Sports had been made during the announcement, much to the shock of many.
The heart of the matter
Gutta, of course, is no stranger to receiving criticism and being an object of harassment on social media. Today, however, it scaled new heights as a particular miscreant even went on to comment that one should not expect to be taken seriously if she has put up a display picture like Gutta’s.
Someone of Gutta’s stature should be aware of the proceedings and the latest developments. But, obviously, she was speaking out of angst at Sports not being mentioned during the presentation which clearly shows that our government is in the least bit serious about Sports in the country.
With the FIFA U-17 World Cup to be hosted in India later this year and two big events, the Commonwealth Games and the Asian Games coming up next year, one would have expected a bit more transparency in Mr Jaitley’s speech.
What’s next?
Gutta is one the most successful and most experienced badminton players in the country. She is definitely one of India’s major hopes for a medal at the Commonwealth Games next year if she is able to maintain her fitness.
Sportskeeda’s take
Nowadays, expressing personal opinions on social networking platforms is becoming hazardous. It is apparent that the 33-year-old outspoken badminton player was oblivious of the budgetary allocation and while we may inform her about the actual allocation, we cannot mock her and troll her for a mistake. Everyone is human, and every human is entitled to honest mistakes.
