Let a Thousand IPLs Bloom
India needs to look at sports as a giant job-creating, hyper-local economic enterprise
When Taylor Swift fans stomp their feet in rhythmic ecstasy at the pop star’s overflowing venues, the earth trembles, on a scale large enough for a seismograph to take note. President Barack Obama is partnering NBA Africa to scout for fresh talent and promote the game of basketball in Africa.
These are just two indicators that suggest the scale of entertainment, broadly defined to include spectator sports, besides fiction, television, gaming, song, dance, drama, movies, eating out and tourism. Large-scale economic activities are what create jobs in large numbers.
In the run-up to the budget, serious-minded worthies are busy making learned recommendations on how to boost manufacturing and create sustainable manufacturing jobs. This, in itself, is a generator of minor employment. A more useful pursuit might be to explore ways to maximise job creation in entertainment, broadly defined.
This is not to dismiss the importance of manufacturing but merely to accept that, in a globalised world, local manufacturing has to compete with highly automated manufacturing elsewhere, that today’s manufacturing jobs demand a degree of skilling beyond the reach of most jobseekers, and each sustainable manufacturing job has to be backed up with significant amounts of invested capital at the level where the job is created and at higher levels. The scope to increase the number of manufacturing jobs is not, therefore, huge.
At the same time, people, particularly the young, need jobs in increasing numbers. Entertainment could well be the source of a large supply of jobs.
Several segments of entertainment are doing quite well, on their own. Talent shows on TV boost song, dance, acting, acrobatics, mimicry, juggling and magic. Video distribution on social media helps millions of talented Indians reach audiences they otherwise could not have accessed.
The uncanny genius of Indian politicians to be unwittingly comical has served as the basis on which to build profitable careers, for stand-up comedians, and professional trolls, whose memes and one-liners suffuse social media.
Those who film performers in all the fields mentioned above, and those who arrange the lights and manage the sound, those who edit the resulting footage — they all find work they could not have had, in the absence of vibrant social media.
The one sector that does not seem to generate a whole lot of jobs without outside help is sports. Indian Premier League (IPL) shows the enormous potential of a popular sport to create lakhs of jobs — in advertising, merchandising, ticketing, food and beverage sales at stadia, food and beverage delivery at the elbow of the couch-ridden cricket fan, television programming and, shh… betting.
IPL has democratised the game, dug out talent outside the genteel circles of the urban elite and brought to the fore youngsters, who struggle to vocalise thoughts beyond stock phrases — ‘the boys played very well’ — but play great cricket.
India does have 10 major leagues for sports ranging from football and hockey to kho kho and kabaddi, as well as dozens of smaller leagues, ranging from Andhra Premier League to Zee Maharashtra Kusti Dangal. The potential of organised sport is gradually being recognised by industry, in general, and some industrial houses in particular.
But given India’s vast population and geographic spread, India should have thousands of leagues at all levels for all different sports, ranging from sevens football (football, played with seven members to a side, some of them recruited from abroad) in Kerala, to khodar khan (hitting a wooden ball with a wooden stick) in Kashmir, and pcheda (teams competing to throw a bamboo stick the farthest) in Nagaland.
The more local the sport and league, the greater the likely local enthusiasm. The smaller leagues should feed talent to larger leagues, which should support the smaller leagues to develop and deliver that talent.
Official policy on sport development targets nurturing talent, offers fellowships, training for sports officials and such like, and offers less than ₹3,500 cr of support out of a budget of ₹45 lakh cr. Policy sees sports as an area of physical excellence channelled by mental stamina, to win medals at Olympic and other global meets. It does not see sport as a potentially gigantic segment of the ever-expanding entertainment business, capable of employing millions in myriad capacities.
How should the government support sports? Not by giving tax breaks to sports leagues or to industrialists who invest in sports leagues, or primarily by increasing the number of sports fellowships and scholarships. GoI should offer states fiscal support for financing the creation of places where sports can take place. This should not, and cannot, be planned at the national level, or at the state capital. It can be done only at the local level, of village and town.
The state must formulate policy to incentivise the availability of open spaces for young people to play, of stadia at least at the level of the taluq, and of broadband connectivity at the village level, so that local sporting events can be broadcast over the internet. Policy must guard against prejudice towards animal-sourced protein foods, milk, meat and eggs.
Sporting excellence transcends divisions of caste and community. And when excellence wins money for those who invest in sporting excellence, greed would fight prejudice and discrimination. Leagues for women sports would help society achieve gender equality.
Here is to Faster, Higher, Stronger —Together!