Why the Right to Play can create an inclusive forum
Governments should create enabling conditions for sports and improve public health and education infrastructure
We live in an age of glorious contradictions. Well into the 21st century, millions of children are denied the right to play. Sport is the best way to constructively channelise the enormous energy in children. Play prepares them to be better citizens. Little wonder then that cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar wants the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education bill to be amended to include the Right to Play.
Children should play and the rest of us should ensure that their right to play is realised. This is especially relevant in a young country such as India where more than half of the country’s 1.25 billion population is below the age of 25 and more than two-thirds, below 35. But our demographic dividend does not necessarily translate into India being a healthy country. We have one of the highest levels of malnutrition in the world and the lowest public health expenditure, around 1.5 % of the GDP. A sporting society is a healthy society. We, at the moment, though a young nation, are not particularly robust. This is illustrated by the fact that apart from being the global diabetes hotspot, we are the third most obese nation in the world.
The Right to Play has to be a universal obligation, not just for various governments but also for corporate, private and non-governmental entities. I have realised that sports is one of the most potent instruments to create an egalitarian society by inculcating a sense of self-worth and fair play. It also helps integrate the underprivileged with the mainstream by providing them with an inclusive forum, in the process developing their confidence, talent, even leadership skills.
In the last few years, despite being committed to a globalised world, many leading democracies have sought more protection and restricted the movement of people across borders. With protectionism becoming popular, identity considerations and radicalism have become stronger. In a fractured society, the Right to Play can act as the social glue. History has lessons for us here. The communists for long thought the Olympics were a capitalist conspiracy till they started participating in them. It was sports that kept the world together in the Cold War era .
Governments and various other stakeholders in society should come together and make the Right to Play a reality. Governments should encourage sports by creating enabling conditions, and by improving public health and education infrastructure at the grassroots. They should take ownership of the cause — the right to play— but not own and run sports. We all have to play our part. Siddhartha Upadhyay is founder and general secretary of the nonprofit STAIRS and member, governing council, Sports Authority of India The views expressed are personal