Mandaviya chairs CSR roundtable for sports development

New Delhi: With the objective of boosting country’s sports ecosystem in order to host the 2036 Olympics, sports minister Mansukh Mandaviya urged corporates to adopt a sport each during the first-ever corporate roundtable here on Thursday.

Mandaviya emphasised a vision to position India among the top five global sports performers by 2047, the 100th year of India’s independence. Aiming to bridge the gap between aspirations and execution, he stressed the critical role of Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) in building sustainable sports infrastructure and talent development programs. He also proposed that PSUs should support state-level requirements to achieve sporting excellence.

“Each corporate entity should focus on a single sport to ensure dedicated attention and optimal resource allocation, while also enabling effective athlete branding to align with CSR investments and promotional activities,” Mandaviya said.

The minister also asked the corporates to contribute towards upgrading sports facilities in existing district-level schools in line with the District Level Sports Schools in Gujarat. He further spoke about developing Olympic Training Centres, sports academies, funding the training and coaching of TOPS athletes besides being actively involved in the organisation of national leagues in disciplines where it is yet to be staged.

More than 40 corporate houses and organisations working in the sports ecosystem shared their knowledge and opinions in a first-ever open house with the minister.

Corporate bigwigs who attended the event lauded the initiative saying that it can become a gamechanger for the Indian sports ecosystem. The corporates can also become thematic partners for Khelo India mission, indigenous sports, para sports and sports for women programmes apart from the establishment of sports science centres and performance testing labs.

Speaking after the meeting, JSW Sports MD Parth Jindal said, “The minister wanted to understand our opinion on how to take Indian sports forward. The government is already doing a lot of incredible work in sports and even the corporates are doing their bit. We need to work together so that the athletes are happy and we can improve our medal tally at the 2036 Olympics.”