National Sports Academy fiasco
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, September 08 2017: The High Court of Manipur today took suo moto cognisance of the students who left the National Sports Academy, located at Khuman Lampak Sports Complex, on September 3 on the ground of sheer incompetence of the management running the academy.

According to reliable sources, a division bench comprising acting Chief Justice of Manipur HC N Koteshwar and Justice Kh Nobin took cognisance of the issue based on newspaper reports that were published on Sep 4 and further the suo-moto case today .

Subsequently, the Court issued notices to the related authorities including the Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), Manipur Government and the Central Government .

Taking note of the fact that this is the second instance of students leaving this Academy, the Court said that it has taken the matter seriously and added that it is unfortunate that this is happening in a State which produces sports players who bring laurels not only for the State but also for the Nation .

Sources said that HIgh Court has also asked the State Government through the Director of Youth Affairs and Sports to personally see into the matter, visit the Academy and submit a report to the Court by Sep 13.It is added that the bench has also given direction to the National Sports Academy to send a responsible official to the Court .

It may be mentioned that the National Sports Academy was established with support from the DoNER on July 7, 2007 with an objective to produce world-class Olympians from the North East region.

Initially, the Academy offered courses in five disciplines including archery, boxing, judo, taekwondo and wrestling and later, it added weightlifting .

However, with fading Olympic dreams, the students had been facing only nightmares resulting from mismanagement and lack of facilities.

Before leaving, the students complained that in the last three/four years, their kits never arrived on time that made their training meaningless.

In this academy that has Classes VI to XII, they charged, there are only 12 teachers, which is grossly disproportionate to the number of students.

Another complaint of the students is that the academy has neither a subject expert nor a competent authority to look into the missing/lacking facilities .

The students also alleged that the management had delivered nothing despite several assurances.

In one of such instances, the management had promised to provide one of their demands by September 2 but in vain.

Therefore, the next day, they said they took the last resort of packing their bags and leaving the academy as they saw no reasons for putting up at such a place any more.

Comment