Hailing from Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh, Krishna shot to fame by playing a major role in Odisha hosting several international competitions, including back-to-back Mens Hockey World Cup, Asian Athletics Championship and constructing a number of new stadiums, including the Birsa Munda International Hockey Stadium in Rourkela. He was instrumental in the State setting up High Performance Centres in collaboration with multi-national companies.

But the development projects could not produce the desired results in terms of on-field results. Despite spending money like water, the national and international success Odisha achieved during the last 10 years was far from satisfactory. While representation of Odisha players in the National teams dwindled, efforts, if any, to bring new talents to the fore did not bear fruit.

The DSYS drew criticism in terms of poor quality infrastructure as stadiums started to leak and boundary walls, statues crumbled at many places. The Sports Department roped in sportspersons from other states to win medals for Odisha, while home-grown talents struggled for opportunities.

Be it hosting international events or creating new infrastructure facilities, the DSYS projects were mostly confined to Bhubaneswar and Rourkela. The scenario at grassroots level remained neglected. Highly paid foreign coaches and professionals were hired to train talents, while native coaches were made to do sundry jobs.

It is alleged that during the tenure of Vineel Krishna, DSYS functioned more as a Publicity Department of the ruling Biju Janata Dal, its supremo Naveen Patnaik and MNCs. There was no transparency on how much money was spent in this regard.

It is also alleged that DSYS was controlling State level autonomous sports bodies in order to have monopoly to sports administration and management in Odisha. Hockey Association of Odisha almost became a Government body with its office-bearers and managers getting remuneration from tax-payers’ money.

Keeping in mind all these factors, the functioning of Vineel Krishna was under scrutiny after the BJP Government came to power. Especially, lack of transparency in collection and utilisation of astronomical amounts of funds by the DSYS had raised eyebrows. The transfer Krishna to an unimportant post has, thus, confirmed the belief that all was not well DSYS under his stewardship.

Hopefully, new Secretary Bhaskar Jyoti Sarma, a 1999 batch IAS officer, will work for real, not cosmetic, development of sports in Odisha and under his guidances DSYS will give priority to the interest of native sportspersons, coaches and support staff and enable them achieve greater glory for the State.
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PHOTO: File pictures of outgoing Sports Sports Secretary R Vineel Krishna (Top) and his successor Bhaskar Jyoti Sarma.