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Sports Budget slashed for the indian sports industry

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In an unprecedented event for India, first February witnessed a heavy level of activity in the finance world of India. The financial budget came as bad dream for those who love the sports and for the followers of #sportstalksocial.

When the stock markets of India saluted the financial budget for the first time in last nine years, the numbers were not very appealing for the sports community.

The finance minister allocated Rs 2596.14 crore to the sports budget for the financial year 2021-22. This is a reduction of Rs. 230.78 crore when compared to the amount earmarked initially for the previous year. It is beyond understanding why the sports budgets were reduced.
The Sports Ministry's flagship Khelo India has been allocated Rs 660.41 crore, which is a huge reduction from Rs 890.42 crore allocated in the 2020-21 budget.

This year's allocated amount is Rs 795.99 crore more than the revised budget of 2020-21. However, the spending last year was severely impacted after Tokyo Olympics was postponed, domestic events were cancelled in almost all sports and no foreign training and competition were possible for most of the Indian athletes.

The sports ministry bears the cost of all foreign training and competition, including participation in the Olympics.

Initially, sports was allocated Rs 2826.92 in last year's budget which was later revised to Rs 1800.15 after all sporting events across the world came to a halt because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

There was hardly any activity last year as most of the national camps were closed because of the lockdown.

In terms of infrastructure development and upgradation of stadiums too, there was hardly any progress because of the pandemic," the official added, without divulging further details.

The financial allocation towards Khelo India programme, which got Rs 890.42 crore in the last budget, was reduced to Rs 657.71 core.

The Sports Authority of India, whose allocation was reduced to Rs 500 crore in the last budget, got a substantial hike this time with the government proposing an increase of Rs 160.41 crore taking the total to Rs 660.41 crore.

The SAI is the nodal organisation to manage nationals camps, provide infrastructure, equipment and other logistics to the country’s sportspersons.

The allocation towards National Sports Federations (NSFs), which received a cold shoulder in the last budget, was also hiked by Rs 35 crore to Rs 280 crore.

As far as incentives for sportspersons are concerned, the budget has proposed to further slash the amount from Rs 70 crore to Rs 53 crore. This is an interesting topic for #sportstalk. Those who get the glamour to the industry, those who work hard, those who make these government bureaucrats successful get a very small pie of the whole allocation. Now the government has reduced even that amount

The budget for National Sports Development Fund has also been halved to Rs 25 crore.