The 36th National Games 2022, which was held across six cities of Gujarat, concluded on Wednesday with the Services Sports Control Board topping the medal tally by winning 128 medals, including 61 gold, followed by Maharashtra, Haryana, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu on the chart table. It was the Services’ fourth consecutive championship title at the National Games. The country’s prestigious multi-event sporting extravaganza, which returned after a gap of seven long years, witnessed about 7,000 athletes from 28 states, eight Union Territories and Services (Indian Armed Forces) competing for medals in 36 sporting disciplines. For the first time, Yogasana was included in the games, a few years after the Sports Ministry formally recognised it as a competitive sport. One of the key moments of the event was a 10-year-old young prodigy Shauryajit Khaire winning bronze medal in Individual Pole (Mallakhamb), which astonished everyone and prompted Prime Minister Narendra Modi to tweet “What a star Shauryajit is”. The sporting event was no doubt a success but the multiple postponements, besides the delay caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, should have been avoided. The main objective of the National Games, called Indian Olympic Games when it was first held in 1924, is to identify talents who can represent the country at the Olympics and other international events. Had the National Games 2022 not been held or postponed, we wouldn’t have witnessed Khaire’s feat, and more importantly deprived the sportspersons of competing on the big stage.
With regard to the performance of the Northeast in the just concluded National Games, the region won 93 medals including 38 gold, while Manipur stood in the ninth position on the chart table with 50 medals, including 20 gold, followed by Assam (28 medals, 10 gold), and Arunachal Pradesh (7 medals, 6 gold), while Meghalaya and Nagaland failed to open its account. It was a decent show but the analysis of performance over the past few years has exposed a downward trend. After winning the championship title at the 1999 games, Manipur slipped to second position in 2007 and 2011, further to seventh position in 2015 and then to ninth this year. Assam, which stood in the third position in 2007 games, slipped to 10th spot in 2015 and then to 14th place this year. As for Nagaland, the state won 11 medals, including one gold, in the 2007 edition of the event but bagged only two bronze in 2011 before drawing a blank in the following two editions, including this year. Only Arunachal Pradesh has shown some degree of improvement at the games in terms of medal count. The region, which is often referred to as the new powerhouse of Indian sports, should put up a better show at the 37th edition of the National Games in Goa next year. For this, support from the state governments is needed.