‘Sports’ today
stands to defy its traditional meaning which merely meant ‘recreation and
pleasant pastime’. It has become a profession involving skill, a commercialised
entertainment, a market in itself. It forms a major part of everyday routine of
many people and draws the interest of variant age groups. The importance of
sports in the present society can easily be gauged by the fact that we have as
many sports channels on television today as the news or entertainment channels;
at least three pages are devoted to sports in every leading daily. At the same
time, the Indian sports market, comprising of the gate revenues, media rights,
sponsorships and merchandising has been estimated to be approximately 1,648
million USD in the year 2013.[1] In
India ,
the impact factor of sports goes so far that we have felt the need to honour a
sportsperson with one of the highest civilian award.
Sports in India have had its
fair share of controversies too. Be it match fixing in cricket which led to
ouster of some of the best players of their times and recently the spot fixing
in IPL which again involved some of the leading names, or instances of doping
by our wrestlers and boxers which have led to their blacklisting. Apart from
this, we have also witnessed the CWG Scam which lifted the veil of corruption
and mismanagement by the authorities, as also the instances of lack of
recognition to leading sportspersons of the not-so-popular sports.
We, in India , have a full fledged Ministry devoted to sports,
at both Union and State level. Recognition is
given to young sportspersons in the form of sports quota for admissions in Universities
and for appointment in government jobs. In spite of this, we do not have any
national law for governing and regulating different aspects of sports like:
(a)
organization, control and regulation of sports bodies;
(b)
good governance and transparency therein;
(c)
formulation and adherence to best practices in sports;
(d)
enactment and enforcement of proper rules to govern
participation and selection of sports persons to represent India ;
(e)
avoidance of substance abuse;
(f)
match fixing and betting practices;
(g)
broadcasting rights;
(h)
welfare measure for sports persons (including removal
of gender discrimination, contractual issues, benefits, etc);
(i)
resolution of
sports disputes;
(j)
standardisation of sports quota and parameters
determining it, etc.
The government
has made efforts to regulate sports law, in the form of the National Sports
Development Bill, 2013 and the Prevention of Sporting Fraud Bill, 2013 which
are pending discussion in Parliament. It is time that same is subjected to
in-depth scrutiny so that gaps could be cleared.
Herein comes,
the Amity Competition on Law Reforms (ACLR), the unique concept initiated by
the Amity Law School, Noida, in the field of legislative drafting. The aim of
the 3rd ACLR is to give a platform to young legal minds to discuss
about the issues stated in above paras and come up with a draft legal regime in
order to make a contribution in the field of Sports Law.
[1] The statistical data is available
at: http://www.statista.com/statistics/214970/revenue-of-the-indian-sports-market/
(last visited on November 29, 2013).
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