Odisha is getting around 90 indoor complexes, besides the existing 34 facilities, at a cost of about Rs 800 crore. (Photo via Twitter/@sports_odisha)
When the Indian football team won the Intercontinental Cup on June 18, beating Lebanon in the final, the venue Kalinga Stadium was already hosting another event. The National inter-state athletics at the same facility in Bhubaneswar, which ended on 19 June, showcased the kind of versatility Odisha is aiming for as a sporting destination and nursery for talent development.
An indoor athletic stadium at the Kalinga complex that will allow top athletes to train through the year will get inaugurated soon. Around 90 indoor complexes, besides an existing 34, costing about Rs 800 crore are getting constructed across Odisha in a show of affiliation to sport that’s rare among state governments. All of these 124 will have badminton training centres, most would have table tennis as well. The core of sporting disciplines that the state is investing in includes swimming, athletics, weightlifting, hockey, shooting, karate, kho kho, rugby and tennis.
Bhubaneswar Football Academy with artificial football turf. (Photo via Twitter/ @rvineel_krishna)
Many disciplines are being developed with a public-private partnership. Anil Kumble’s firm Tenvic manages the high-performance centre for weightlifting—there are 53 lifting training centres across the state. Badminton is in partnership with Pullela Gopichand and Dalmiya Group while hockey is with the Tata Group. JSW Sports will run the swimming coaching programme, across 30 training centres. JSW Group appointed South African Douglas Eager and Olympian Sandeep Sejwal last May to lead the Odisha JSW Swimming High Performance Centre (OJSHPC) based out of the Kalinga Stadium. A sports science centre runs in partnership with Abhinav Bindra Targeting Performance (ABTP).
“Learning from Covid, these will be sports complexes in regular time and will become relief centres or quarantine centres during a pandemic or disaster,” says Vineel Krishna, special secretary to Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, and secretary of sports and youth services. “We have the sports science centre (with ABTP) in Kalinga which we are expanding, coming up with a larger centre which will be functional in the next few weeks. It’s a pioneering effort in trying to bring high performance using latest scientific techniques and equipment, which is important for going through injury management, recovery and rehabilitation.”
“When we create something like this (the indoor athletic stadium), it’s not just for Odisha. You can have Indian camps here. The biggest problem is the hot and rainy seasons. Athletes can’t practice through the year. They need indoor facilities, which are costly but required if you have to train through the year. For instance, Neeraj Chopra practised here before the (2021) Olympics because it was too cold in Patiala.”
Hockey is one of the sporting disciplines which has the state’s attention, especially as Odisha is one of the states that has consistently fed players to the national team. Not surprisingly, two big, well-publicized stadiums, Kalinga Sports Complex in Bhubaneshwar and Birsa Munda Hockey Village in Rourkela, which hosted this year’s FIH men’s World Cup, have come up as part of this sporting drive. “We want children from the grassroots level to be exposed to the best facilities,” Krishna says over the phone. “Why Indian hockey has come down over a period of time since the 1970s was the shift from grass to synthetic (playing surface). It gave an advantage to Europeans, who could afford this high-cost investment and we could not. We want children, from an early age of 8-9 years, to get used to synthetic turf.”
Kalinga Stadium in Odisha (Photo via Twitter/@rvineel_krishna)
The sports department has already increased its budget over the last four years. From around Rs 300 crore, the number has reached Rs 1,300 crore besides ongoing infrastructure projects worth Rs 2,500 crore across the state.
“What we are doing is not just for Odisha—it’s for the country as whole,” adds Krishna, whose mandate includes sports development in Odisha, from the state to grassroots level, infrastructure development across all levels and international and domestic competitions.
The media-savvy bureaucrat agrees with a laugh that there are no tangible outcomes to this kind of an investment towards a seemingly altruistic cause of encouraging sport and thereby better public health. “It’s difficult to say what the outcome would be, similar to a hospital or a school. These are long-term investments that will not give you a return in 3-5 years. There will be returns, but something more conspicuous, like celebrating a medal when we win one. One medal may inspire thousands to take up sport. They may not all win medals, but will be healthier, better citizens.”
The centres would function in a combination of free and paid venues. Some sports, like badminton, swimming and tennis, attract middle-class families, Krishna says, where parents are able to spend money. “Sports like hockey are not a middle-class sport—most children come from tribal communities. So they are free. Athletics and football are paid for use in cities but not in other places. We have a large hostel system with 1400 residents, which is free for them as they come from tribal and under-privileged communities.”
Sports facilities in India, sometimes built for the sake of an international event, lie dormant post the event. But Krishan says they are conscious about keeping all units functioning for the sake of maintenance. “There is a cost involved and the chief minister gives us a free hand with no restrictions on budgets for our initiatives,” he says.