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   Manipur is
fortunate for one thing at least. Every once in a while a shooting star
lights up its dark sky. The latest of these meteors to add glimmer to
the front pages of local dailies, splattered so irredeemably with news
of blood and gore perennially, is Thokchom Nanao Singh, the junior
boxer who just became a world champion yesterday, inheriting a rich
legacy left behind by sport stars such as MC Mary Kom, and before her,
Ngangom Dingko. World champion Mary Kom is going through a bad phase,
burdened physically and psychologically by the demands of motherhood,
but being the fighter that she is, we have every confidence she would
rise to shine again soon. We hope she peaks again in time for the
London Olympics in 2012. Dingko, another extremely talented and
promising boxer, faded away and according to reports, an injury has
virtually ended his boxing career. He won the King’s cup in Bangkok in
1997 as well as the tournament’s best boxer title, and then went on to
win the Asian title in 1998 thrashing the then world No. 2 in the 54kg
class in the final. When he won the Asian title, the IFP was the only
voice calling for restraint in the public euphoria and to those
showering him with gifts and official largess, in the belief that this
would spoil him and soften the fighter. We remember the hate mails we
received as well as published consistently in another vernacular daily
for the stand we had then taken. We stand somewhat vindicated. But as
much as those who chose to fatally fatten the young boxer’s ego are not
bothered about the fate of the faded star, we are deeply saddened. We
hope the society has realised how harmful such pampering can be.

Nanao
is young and full of fire. Given a good coach and counselling, he will
definitely be a gold medal hope in the London Olympics. That would be
such an ecstatic moment for all of us in the state. India has one
individual Olympics gold to its credit now with Abhinav Bhindra winning
in the air rifle event in Beijing. But this is a sporting discipline
out of reach of most Indians. This is not in any way to undermine the
shooter’s talent, but the fact is he practiced in a world class private
indoor air-conditioned firing range his millionaire father built him,
with a Rs. 25 lakh air rifle. It is difficult for the ordinary person
to identify with that kind of sport. The only sportspersons who can
compete in it are those from the rich Western countries, or else from
Communist countries where the state takes care of the expensive
infrastructure and makes the sport available to everybody, rich and
poor. Indeed, as in the Beijing Olympics where he was top, his close
competition opponents in London again would probably be some factory
worker or the other from China or North Korea. This is also why, the
two bronze that India won, one in boxing and the other in wrestling,
had much more public appeal, for in sports like boxing, wrestling,
athletics, the premium is on natural sporting instinct, and then on the
standard of grooming. In this sense, if Thokchom Nanao or Mary Kom or
anybody else in any of the common man’s sporting disciplines strikes
gold in London, it would in many ways still be India’s first true
individual Olympics gold.

Back to Nanao. Many in this conflict zone
would have noticed there is something of interest common between the
Dingko and Nanao. They are both army men. The implication is, when the
army is not in fighting mode, it can sublimate its fighting energy into
other creative channels. Sport being the first and direct generation of
this sublimation process, it would be the obvious and most productive
choice for the army to focus on in peacetime. Art, cinema, theatre etc,
psychologists now tell us, belong to this same process although at more
sophisticated levels. In the event of such a happy circumstance, the
image of the army in the state would have altered considerably too. At
the moment this image is of soldiers, aloof from the people, and
trained to kill. There is no denying that the army cannot shed this
image totally, but it can overcome this without sacrificing the
distance it needs, by somewhat taking up the role of the state in a
Communist country and provide the best sporting facilities and coaching
to natural sportsmen and women.

Author	Message Share Topic Printable Version Google Delicious Digg StumbleUpon Windows Live Yahoo Bookmarks reddit Facebook MySpace Newsvine Furl Topic Search Topic Options Post Reply Create New Topic
kooldude Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Newbie Joined: 27 Oct 2007 Online Status: Offline Posts: 12	Post Options Post Reply Quote kooldude Report Post Quote Reply Topic: A Star in the Horizon Posted: 21 Nov 2008 at 1:10am
	Manipur is fortunate for one thing at least. Every once in a while a shooting star lights up its dark sky. The latest of these meteors to add glimmer to the front pages of local dailies, splattered so irredeemably with news of blood and gore perennially, is Thokchom Nanao Singh, the junior boxer who just became a world champion yesterday, inheriting a rich legacy left behind by sport stars such as MC Mary Kom, and before her, Ngangom Dingko. World champion Mary Kom is going through a bad phase, burdened physically and psychologically by the demands of motherhood, but being the fighter that she is, we have every confidence she would rise to shine again soon. We hope she peaks again in time for the London Olympics in 2012. Dingko, another extremely talented and promising boxer, faded away and according to reports, an injury has virtually ended his boxing career. He won the King’s cup in Bangkok in 1997 as well as the tournament’s best boxer title, and then went on to win the Asian title in 1998 thrashing the then world No. 2 in the 54kg class in the final. When he won the Asian title, the IFP was the only voice calling for restraint in the public euphoria and to those showering him with gifts and official largess, in the belief that this would spoil him and soften the fighter. We remember the hate mails we received as well as published consistently in another vernacular daily for the stand we had then taken. We stand somewhat vindicated. But as much as those who chose to fatally fatten the young boxer’s ego are not bothered about the fate of the faded star, we are deeply saddened. We hope the society has realised how harmful such pampering can be. Nanao is young and full of fire. Given a good coach and counselling, he will definitely be a gold medal hope in the London Olympics. That would be such an ecstatic moment for all of us in the state. India has one individual Olympics gold to its credit now with Abhinav Bhindra winning in the air rifle event in Beijing. But this is a sporting discipline out of reach of most Indians. This is not in any way to undermine the shooter’s talent, but the fact is he practiced in a world class private indoor air-conditioned firing range his millionaire father built him, with a Rs. 25 lakh air rifle. It is difficult for the ordinary person to identify with that kind of sport. The only sportspersons who can compete in it are those from the rich Western countries, or else from Communist countries where the state takes care of the expensive infrastructure and makes the sport available to everybody, rich and poor. Indeed, as in the Beijing Olympics where he was top, his close competition opponents in London again would probably be some factory worker or the other from China or North Korea. This is also why, the two bronze that India won, one in boxing and the other in wrestling, had much more public appeal, for in sports like boxing, wrestling, athletics, the premium is on natural sporting instinct, and then on the standard of grooming. In this sense, if Thokchom Nanao or Mary Kom or anybody else in any of the common man’s sporting disciplines strikes gold in London, it would in many ways still be India’s first true individual Olympics gold. Back to Nanao. Many in this conflict zone would have noticed there is something of interest common between the Dingko and Nanao. They are both army men. The implication is, when the army is not in fighting mode, it can sublimate its fighting energy into other creative channels. Sport being the first and direct generation of this sublimation process, it would be the obvious and most productive choice for the army to focus on in peacetime. Art, cinema, theatre etc, psychologists now tell us, belong to this same process although at more sophisticated levels. In the event of such a happy circumstance, the image of the army in the state would have altered considerably too. At the moment this image is of soldiers, aloof from the people, and trained to kill. There is no denying that the army cannot shed this image totally, but it can overcome this without sacrificing the distance it needs, by somewhat taking up the role of the state in a Communist country and provide the best sporting facilities and coaching to natural sportsmen and women.

ManipurPage

A Star in the Horizon