Indian Olympic Association President Narinder Batra has been left disappointed after many national federations missed the first deadline for submitting their responses for providing IOA with their feedback on how to restart national camps amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
On May 5, the IOA had invited suggestions from National Sports Federations (NSF), State Olympic Associations (SOA) and other stakeholders for the preparation of a white paper, detailing steps to resume sports in the country amid the coronavirus pandemic which has claimed more than 3,000 lives in the country.
IOA receives 430 responses on suggestions to restart sports in the country
The IOA had also sent a document in which deadlines of May 20 and May 31 were given for the sports bodies to share their suggestions. The IOA, has now, informed that so far it has received 430 responses, a major portion of which -- over 40 per cent -- is from the athletes. 33.5 per cent of responses have come from match officials. Sports administrators and high-performance support team constitute 14.9 and 7.9 per cent of the responses, respectively.
"Personally disappointed at the non-seriousness of Olympic sports (bodies) who were to revert by 20th May and did not revert," Batra expressed. "I sincerely hope that the NSFs and SOAs who are to revert by 30th May, 2020 are taking it seriously and the defaulters of 20th May deadline will revert urgently," he added.
Central and state government ministries, sponsors, media, fans, doctors, virologists and sports medicine experts have also been asked for their responses. The sporting calendar screeched to a halt in March due to the coronavirus pandemic and many athletes have been confined to their hostels in Sports Authority of India (SAI) facilities in the country due to the lockdown that has been in place since March 25.
Under the guidelines for Lockdown 4.0 issued on May 17, the Indian government has allowed stadiums to open and allowed training behind closed doors.
