Little more than an empty gesture

Despite the introduction of the Bangladesh Youth Games, the nation is still apparently dwelling in the "something is better than nothing" era when it comes to forging a proper pipeline for athletes.

While neighbouring India has been staging the 'Khelo India Youth Games' every year at the cost of hundreds of crores since 2018, Bangladesh, which staged its first Youth Games in the same year, remains light years behind.

On the surface, the two crore taka that has been allocated to the Bangladesh Olympic Association (BOA) for the ongoing 2nd Bangladesh Youth Games -- against an estimated budget of 40 crore, later revised to 22-25 crore -- simply pales in comparison to the 1,045 crore rupees allotted for the sixth edition of the Khelo India Youth Games 2023.

But whereas the BOA has to be satisfied by providing a one-off long-term training programme to the best players from each discipline, India has been providing the top two players from each discipline in the Khelo India Youth Games with an eight-year scholarship amounting to Rs 5 lakh annually.

Through such incentives, India has been encouraging world-class athletes and winning medals from the biggest multi-sports extravaganza such as the Olympics, Asian Games and Commonwealth Games. Bangladesh, meanwhile, has to rely on a few medals from the regional South Asian Games.

When asked why athletes were shorn of further opportunities upon the completion of Youth Games, BOA secretary general Syed Shahed Reza said: "Although the federations have financial limitations, I think they should come forward and take the responsibility of grooming players and bringing talented players into training. We will definitely help them continue training."

He added: "We also need infrastructure to facilitate training and build up coaches who can train the athletes at a higher level. We will try to bring high-performance coaches from aboard to train athletes or send athletes with the potential to China, Thailand, South Korea, Malaysia or India for training ahead of big international competitions."

But it remains questionable whether the Youth Games has been serving its purpose.

The BOA introduced the Youth Games in 2018, five years after bringing back the Bangladesh Games which had been on hiatus for 12 years, in an attempt to increase the youth's interest towards sports and provide a rare platform for young athletes since most national federations do not have age-group level competitions.

Although the move was hailed, the first edition drew plenty of criticism from the sports fraternity due to messy arrangements, especially at the district level, where oddities included athletes running barefoot with jerseys draped over their day-to-day outfits.

"Last time we did not know how to start and how to finish because there was no example to follow. So, there were many problems during the first edition. But this time around we took those aspects into consideration and rectified the mistakes before holding the 2nd edition of the Games," Reza said.

Reza also pointed out some positives, such as the increasing number of participants. The first edition featured over 27,000 athletes and officials, which has grown to 60,000 for the second edition.

"Representatives from districts, divisions and federations were very cordial this time. Besides, we also disbursed money before the start of the Games at the district level," Reza said. "I don't want to claim that everything is going perfectly, but I want to say that this time it is being held in a much more organised way compared to the first edition."

Reza also claimed that the event was creating organisers, not just athletes.

"An organiser is recognised when he produces a good player and brings good results. This time there was a competition among organisers, which was absent in the previous edition, because organisers were very keen to deliver results from their own districts."

Reza also opined that holding the Bangladesh Games and Youth Games simultaneously every two years would have a more significant impact in grooming players.

Yet, with 4,000 athletes coming into Dhaka for the final phase to contest 195 events across 24 disciplines, things have been no smoother. Federation officials remain unhappy after being asked to complete their respective events in Dhaka inside three days as they felt it compromised standards.

The BOA, however, maintained that constraints in the budget left no other option, leaving many to wonder how long the BOA can hope to take things forward in lieu of significant financial involvement from the government in sports development.