Updated: 21 April 2022
In the last year, after the sad demise of our very talented actor Sushant Singh Rajpoot, a massive outrage has been observed in India, followed by the rampant media coverage, triggering speculation about a possible nepotism angle to it.
In our country, whichever field we talk about, there is no denying that nepotism has its presence, and when we talk about sports then both of them seem to walk hand in hand.
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Nepotism In Sports In India
The Vice-president of the Indian Olympic Association had sent his own son as a Chief Medical Officer in the 2016 Rio Olympics. He knew nothing about sports medicines. Due to this India got huge embarrassment on the global stage.
At the very helm of Indian cricket lies the BCCI who is the governing body. But they themselves have been in limelight for bad reasons of nepotism. The former chief justice of India, R.M Lodha in an exclusive interview to outlook clearly said that Indian sports suffers from corruption and nepotism and it needs an overarching regulatory body.
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The main motive of Justice Lodha’s reform was to bring a change about how cricket is run in India.
The whole agenda of restricting 70 plus years old and those who had completed a certain period of time at the duty from holding a post in BCCI was to include fresh and young faces. But, instead what we got was kith and kin of old men putting their name forward and eventually getting elected.
Jaywant Lele who is the late BCCI secretary’s son has taken over as the Secretary of Baroda. Chirayu Amin, a well-known face and former IPL chairman and BCCI vice-president, has elected his son as president in the same city.
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Elsewhere, the long-time Himachal Pradesh cricket supremo Anurag Thakur, who also serves as the current Minister of State for Finance, has been replaced by his own brother. The list is endless and it goes on and on.
When we talk about the players, there have been few past names that have come on the radar for nepotism. Rohan Gavaskar was not even a shade of what his father the great Sunil Gavaskar used to be. Stuart Binny, son of Roger Binny, got enough chances in the Indian team and kept disappointing. Stuart was obviously expected to perform. Most of his performances were dismal and he was eventually sidelined from the national side.
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Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi, son of Iftikhar Ali khan had lost one of his eyes in a tragic accident but with his strong willpower, he continued playing cricket with just one eye. His name is still taken with respect in the cricketing fraternity. He was one of the best captains India had ever witnessed. Basically, not everyone related to nepotism has a bad name.
Cricket is a very unique sport. Players need to be of strong character in real life in order to survive in this sport. When we look back, all the great players in Cricket have been equally good personalities. They all have burned the midnight oil in order to get into the team.
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Virat Kohli, unfortunately even played on the day of the death of his father. Such is the temperament that this game demands and it’s not everyone’s cup of tea to survive. KL Rahul, the current young sensation of Indian cricket used to travel 140 KMs every day to play cricket. The great Sachin Tendulkar played 3 games every day.
So, it’s not like someone’s son can’t make it to the team. If he has the talent, the will to walk the extra mile and perform consistently, he can surely reach greater heights. However, purely on his father’s Jack, it’s now become next to impossible to get a call in the team.
You can always market yourself with your father’s reputation, but still, you have to perform to get public acceptance.