What does the Indian government do to improve India’s performance in the Olympics ?
What does the Indian government do to improve India’s performance in the Olympics ? : Recently Tokyo Olympics 2020 has ended, in which India’s best performance till date. This time India has given its best performance by winning 1 gold, 2 silver and 4 bronze medals.
However, in 2012 India did well by winning 6 medals including 2 Silver and 4 Bronze.
The Question was raised in the Rajya Sabha as to what assistance the Government of India provides to the athletes.
Replying to a question in the Rajya Sabha, Anurag Thakur (Sports Minister of India) said that the Sports Ministry of India had launched Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS) in September 2014 to improve India’s performance in the Olympics and Paralympic Games.
The scheme provides coaching to the players from the top coach and helps in buying all the essentials related to the game. At the same time, there is economic support to go to the upcoming Olympics. At the same time, the athlete is also given technical things like life essentials and smart phones.
Anurag Thakur said that the athlete of the core group is given Rs 50,000 every month and Rs 25,000 to the development group. As of today, the core group has 162 athletes (both men’s and women’s) hockey teams, and the development group has 254 athletes.
Anurag Thakur also revealed the year inwhich he spent on the TOPS scheme
- Rs 14.31 lakh crore was spent in 2018-19.
- Rs 12.41 lakh crore in 2019-20
- Rs 15.65 lakh crore was spent in 2020-21.
- Rs 12.48 lakh crore has been spent under the scheme till 4th August in 2021-22.
At the same time, Anurag Thakur said that apart from TOPS, there are other schemes like National Sports Federation Scheme (NSF) and Khelo India.
Anurag Thakur said that several rupees have also been given in the NSF scheme.
- Rs 244 crore was given in 2018-19.
- Rs 301 crore in 2019-20,
- Rs 152 crore in 2020-21,
- In 2021-22, more than Rs.20 crores have been given till 4th August.