In the last few years India has become more of a sporting nation. We have Indian Soccer League, Indian Tennis League, Indian Badminton League, Kabbadi League, not to forget the IPL. The standard of sports is going up. What role do you as a Ministry play in all this?

We are promoting everyone. We are promoting private academies. We are promoting these leagues that you mentioned. We are promoting federations. Let me tell you that we respect their autonomy. At the same time we would want them to demonstrate complete transparency and show accountability. We are geared towards solving the problems of players and coaches. Anybody can meet me 24 hours a day. Nowadays in the Government, you don’t find anyone who says that I have a problem and that nobody is there to help me. Things have changed. 

As a Ministry, how do you promote private associations and leagues?

We are basically promoting the players that are associated with the numerous associations. Take all the top sportspersons, whether they are from athletics, badminton, wrestling, or so many other disciplines, we are very much interested in their progress. We have the Sports Authority of India that provides the infrastructure to shape excellence. Who else but the Ministry can provide the kind of infrastructure that is necessary to give our sports movement a momentum? Soon we are going to launch our sports portal. We want to encourage people from the remotest parts of India to upload their bios and videos so that we can zero in on talent, back that talent, provide them training and scholarships. This way our sporting standards are bound to go up. We have a very vast vision for India as a true sporting nation.