What explains the silence of India’s sporting icons on wrestlers’ protests?
The protests against Wrestling Federation of India President Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, which began in January over allegations of sexual harassment of female wrestlers, have held up a mirror to Indian politics, law and society.
A brief, and by no means exhaustive, checklist of the phenomena uncovered includes the following: First, the law does not apply equally to all citizens. Despite public protests from wrestlers, who have won multiple medals for the country, and an indictment against Singh, the President of the Wrestling Federation of India and MP for the Bharatiya Janata Party has continued to move freely – and until recently made belligerent statements.
There are many who have been put behind bars on far less serious or frivolous charges, but in the Singh case the Supreme Court had to intervene even for a first intelligence report to be registered.
Second, Singh’s immunity from the law pushes the logic of elections and the winnability of elections to extremes. The BJP MP, who wields considerable influence in eastern Uttar Pradesh, is considered indispensable to his party, despite the bad press he gets for the BJP. It also says something about MPs in India, who not only tend to be very wealthy, but whose names are often the subject of criminal charges.
However, as noted by journalist Mukul Kesavan, Singh’s political influence does not fully explain the inaction against him. It also has something to do with the ingrained patriarchy and misogyny within the Sangh Parivar.
Third, the heated comments and protests have again highlighted the role of social media and parts of the traditional media in acting as government cheerleaders. They tried their best to craft the narrative to portray the wrestlers as the real villains, pointing out selection issues and appearing rude for not recognizing the government funds being spent on them.
That narrative didn’t work so well is due to the clumsy attempts by the Delhi police to stop the wrestlers’ protests and the haunting images of the police’s excessive use of force on May 28.
In conclusion: With few exceptions, Indian athletes, particularly India’s star cricketers, have remained silent on the wrestlers’ protests. The stubborn myth that sport has nothing to do with politics should first be dispelled. Like any activity, sport has often been used to make political arguments.
The link between sport and nationalism has been noted by many. Author George Orwell’s famous comment in the context of the Cold War, describing the sport as “war without gunfights,” might be a bit of an exaggeration. But historian Eric Hobsbawm’s statement that sport is “a uniquely potent vehicle for conveying national feelings” is true, whether in sports competitions between India and Pakistan or in Indian teams challenging the British in the pre-independence era.
The link between sporting achievement and nationalism has made it difficult for the government to ignore the wrestlers’ protests. However, instead of responding to the wrestlers’ complaints, the government opted for a wait-and-see attitude for political reasons. While she hoped the protests would die down or die down over time, which was entirely possible, she also had no hesitation in using brute force if necessary.
The government benefited greatly from the fact that most athletes, both current and former, did not support the wrestlers. There were exceptions like Olympic gold medalists Neeraj Chopra and Abhinav Bindra, soccer star Sunil Chhetri and boxer Nikhat Zareen, who expressed concern about the plight of the wrestlers and the way the protests were being handled.
However, cricketers – apart from a handful of former players such as Anil Kumble, Harbhajan Singh and Irfan Pathan – were notable for their silence. The wrestlers later received support from Kapil Dev and the team that won the 1983 World Cup, although unsurprisingly one member – Roger Binny, the current President of the Board for Cricket Control in India – dropped out of the ranks. The sports community’s reaction was perhaps typified by former athlete PT Usha, now President of the Indian Olympic Association and a member of Rajya Sabha, who criticized the wrestlers for their “negative” attitude and for “damaging” the country’s image.
The silence of much of the sports world is hard to understand. However, some clues can be gleaned from an article I co-authored that examines athletes’ social media reactions to politicians, political controversies, and government-sponsored initiatives. Looking at a sample of tweets, we found that Indian athletes used Twitter most often to wish politicians a happy birthday. They have also been heavily involved in amplifying government published content such as the hashtags “indiafightscorona” and “fitindiamovement”. This was in contrast to athletes elsewhere, particularly in the United States.
Most of the athletes, apart from a few like Bajrang Punia or Sakshi Malik, remained silent on controversial topics such as the protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act or the agitation of the farmers. That applied to sensitive issues such as caste or caste violence, although the Indian cricket team surprisingly once took a knee for the Black Lives Matter movement. However, there were moments when athletes almost coordinatedly supported the state’s views during the peasant protests, such as using the hashtag “IndiaAgainstPropaganda,” and many of them used the same text verbatim in their tweets.
Part of the reason for this sluggish behavior lies in the Indian state’s strong involvement in sport and the presence of politicians or their proxies on governing sporting bodies, including the influential Board for Cricket Control in India. Athletes consider the costs of controversial or anti-government statements to be too high. Hence the deafening silence from most of the athletes, who should have been the first to lend their support to the protesting wrestlers.
The author is from the National University of Singapore. He is the author of Nation at Play: A History of Sport in India.