Pune: Former three-time national table tennis champion Vasanth Bharadwaj believes sports administrators often take the “power and authority” of their role seriously but ignore the “service” aspect that comes with their position.“My view, in terms of sports administration, is that our administrators take governance very seriously, but not the service orientation that is needed,” said Bharadwaj, who represented India in the World Championships, Commonwealth Games and Asian Games.“Power and authority is taken seriously. So, ‘I govern the sport’ is very, very, very high in terms of priority. But the other objective of ensuring ‘you serve the athlete’ and the sport diligently is sometimes ignored.“What I mean to say is that a sense of importance should be set aside when it comes to knowing that the athletes’ needs should not suffer.”Bharadwaj, who is currently assisting the Delhi High Court-appointed Administrator of the All India Tennis Association (AITA) with the latter’s national sports code compliance process, was commenting on sports governance in general and the benefits of the National Sports Act 2026 in particular.“The first thing that stands out predominantly is the intent and the effort to make sports governance and administration in the country very athlete centric,” Bharadwaj, who was voted the ‘Best Player in Asia’ in 1987, said of the Sports Act.“If you see the provisions made for athlete representations, sports persons of outstanding merit, having a provision for eminent athletes even at the regional level, these things indicate that a larger participation of athletes in governing themselves will be a desirable outcome. “It is good that the athletes get those seats on the table … My belief is that things will evolve. Players will get wiser. Players will understand the challenges that administrators face.“It is an opportunity for athletes to learn, and then maybe the ones that have the ability, the competence, (will) move into maybe office-bearer and those kinds of roles in the years to come. “I think this is a great beginning,” added Bharadwaj, who successfully transitioned to corporate management while also staying involved in grassroots development.Bharadwaj welcomed the move to restrict the size of the executive committee in national federations to 15.“What this ensures is that, if it is taken in the right letter and spirit of the way it is being designed, it makes sure that everybody who is a part of that body will have to carry his weight in terms of contributing to the sport. One can’t just remain a member, a figurehead, and not be active,” he said.The Sports Act has fixed the upper age-limit of office-bearers at 70 years, but has a provision for them to continue till 75 if their respective world governing body allows them to do so.While the International Tennis Federation makes no mention of an age cap for its office-bearers, Bharadwaj said that in such a case the bar set by the Act will prevail.“If there is no reference to the international body’s best practice provision, then obviously the Indian Act prevails,” he said.
