He once again wrote to De Coubertin, then honorary life president of the IOC, at the conclusion of the Western Asiatic Games. This letter was more in the form of a report detailing the successful organization of the Games in New Delhi.7 In yet another letter written in end May 1934, Sondhi sent De Coubertin the constitution of the Games declaring, ‘At a meeting of the Western Asiatic Games Federation it was decided to adopt the enclosed constitution of the Federation after submitting it to you for your kind opinion. It was felt that the opinion of the founder of the International Olympic Committee should be obtained before making our constitution final. I shall be most thankful if you can find time to go through it and honor us with your remarks’.8
These efforts by Sondhi were clearly aimed at keeping the IOC in good humour, knowing full well that the IOC’s support would prove crucial in shaping the fortunes of the IOA in the first decade of its existence. The IOC’s involvement in IOA activities led by Patiala and Sondhi was decisive in impressing upon rivals that the IOA was the only internationally recognized governing body for Olympic sports in India.
THE POLLUTED POOL: THE EARLY STRUGGLES
OVER SWIMMING
The IOC’s patronage was crucial in tipping the scales in the factional fights that engulfed various Olympic sports in India during the 1930s. A good case in point is the struggle over swimming in this period. That India’s pools had become muddied was first evident when Fédération Internationale de Natation (FINA) in its meeting on 8–9 May 1935 decided to cancel the affiliation of the IOA for non-payment of dues. Going a step further, FINA in a startling move recognized the National Swimming Association (NSA) based in Calcutta as the official governing body for swimming in India.9 The problem was that NSA was simply a small Calcutta body with virtually no standing outside the city. It had cleverly managed to lobby support with FINA but its recognition as the official Indian swimming body was a clear illustration of the challenges faced by early sports administrators as they tried to put in place global systems of governance. Until then, Indian swimming had been controlled by the IOA and on hearing the news in June 1935, a distressed Sondhi immediately turned to the IOC for arbitration. He wrote to the president of the IOC, complaining that FINA’s act was prejudiced and arbitrary. What was most surprising was that FINA had granted affiliation to a body which did not represent more than a handful of clubs in Calcutta. As Sondhi informed the IOC: ‘From inquiries I find that this association does not control swimming even in the whole town of Calcutta, leave alone the whole of the Bengal province, and the country. The F.I.N.A. should before accepting the affiliation of such a one-town Association, have satisfied itself that it really controlled swimming all over the country’.10
So how did this small Calcutta body succeed in convincing FINA of its all-India credentials? It is instructive that NSA won FINA’s favour through systematic lobbying to discredit the IOA. Its officials, on their own accord, wrote to FINA seeking to find out if the IOA had defaulted in paying its membership dues. On hearing that it had, the NSA volunteered on its own accord to pay the outstanding amount. It fraudulently communicated to FINA that it was doing so on the IOA’s behalf, because the body had sanctioned the recognition of the NSA as the governing body for swimming in India. Quite insidiously, NSA officials simultaneously wrote to the IOA, expressing their willingness to bail the body out of financial distress. They indicated that the payments being made to FINA were a gesture of goodwill, never once mentioning that they wanted to replace the IOA as the central administrative body for swimming in the country. When Sondhi discovered the intrigue, he was livid:
…. it seems to me, reading between the lines, that the National Swimming Association is playing a double game, on the one side with F.I.N.A. paying the arrears of the Indian Olympic Association and getting affiliated in its own name; and on the other side writing to the Indian Olympic Association to imply that the arrears have been paid and settled on behalf of the Indian Olympic Association. Apart from everything else then, the very double-dealing of the National Swimming Association should disqualify them from ever representing India. Besides, there is the established point that the National Swimming Association consists of a few swimming clubs of Calcutta and no more.11
In sharp contrast, the IOA enjoyed the affiliation of ‘all the important provinces of India’.12 Having expressed his angst, Sondhi urged the IOC president to intervene on behalf of the IOA and request FINA to hold off on granting affiliation to the NSA before a probe was conducted on whether the association could claim to represent the whole country. He also suggested that FINA should give the IOA an opportunity to pay off its arrears or set up an association representative of Indian swimming. If it did so ‘it will have earned the gratitude not only of the Indian Olympic Association, but also of the vast majority of swimmers in the country’.13
He was confident that swimmers or swimming associations from other parts of the country would refuse to accept the hegemony of the NSA and would be unwilling to join a local body operating out of Calcutta. Having garnered support in western India and strengthened by the growing proximity the IOC, Sondhi denounced the authority of the NSA, arguing that it deceitfully claimed to represent a host of swimming associations of the country. Having done so, the IOA proceeded to challenge the authority of FINA itself by asking the IOC for a series of clarifications: was there any rule of the IOC that a country participating in a particular game in the Olympic Games must be affiliated to the international federation controlling that particular game? Was there a rule of the IOC which prevented a country from taking part in any game or sport in the Olympic Games, if its dues to the appropriate international federation were not settled?14 Sondhi was looking for a way to regain control, and if a loophole could help him circumvent FINA’s authority, he wanted to find it. Simultaneously, the IOA did make an effort to strike a compromise, suggesting that FINA, if it wanted, could empower the IOA to set up a regulatory body for swimming in India.15
Support from the IOC was one prong of the battle. The second challenge was to garner support within India. Accordingly, continuing its offensive against the NSA, the IOA issued a circular to state Olympic Associations urging them to unite in opposition to the rebel body. The circular emphasized that the IOA wasn’t averse to setting up a governing body for swimming, which would include representation from associations across the country. Significantly, the circular also declared that the IOA was in correspondence with the IOC and expected to receive official sanction for its proposals. IOA officials clearly saw the IOC’s support as their ultimate trump card in this struggle for domestic control.
With Sondhi pressing hard for IOC intervention, the NSA launched its own public relations offensive with the Olympic czars in Lausanne. That it was determined to spite the IOA was evident on 16 September 1935 when the joint secretary of the NSA wrote to the president of the IOC. The letter was more of an exploratory probe, aimed at trying to dig up more information about the financial crisis afflicting the IOA and to find out if the crisis had embittered its relations with the IOC. However, the effort to malign the IOA was couched in the benevolent idiom of trying to facilitate the participation of the Indian swimming team at the Berlin Olympic Games. This, the NSA emphasized, wasn’t possible with an impecunious IOA at the helm of Indian swimming. But the real rub lay in the wording:
It is being rumored here that the Indian Olympic Association has failed to meet its financial obligations to your organization and has in all probability lost their affiliation as a result thereof. The Federation Internationale de Natation Amateur has recently been pleased to accept our affiliation with them, subject to the confirmation of certain statements by us and we are vitally interested in the matter as we are making an earnest endeavor to enter a team of Indian swimmers for the forthcoming Olympiad in Berlin.16
Expressing its determination to promote swimming in India, the NSA asked the IOC president for a series of clarifications. Most of these were designed to find out more about the relationship
between the IOA and the IOC and in the process discredit the IOA in the eyes of the parent institution. Even as it enquired if the IOA had defaulted in paying its dues to the IOC, most other clarifications indicated that the NSA was aware of the failure of the IOA to pay up and was using ‘non-payment’ as an opportunity to strike back. It asked the IOC ‘whether the Indian Olympic Association has failed to meet its obligations and thereby forfeited its status? How should entries from India be forwarded to the IOC under such circumstances?’ Also, whether entries for the swimming events at the Berlin Games could be forwarded directly to the IOC by ‘our Association which is the National Governing Body for Swimming in India’ recognized by FINA?17 In effect, the NSA was not just content with winning control over swimming from the IOA. It wanted to finish off the IOA altogether.
The Hatkhola Club and ‘Unfair Treatment’:
Bengal vs the IOA
The battle for hegemony over swimming continued for the next year and a half, with both sides trading charges and trying to enlist the support of the IOC and FINA. The impact of the tussle was felt nationally with clubs from both ends of the Indian heartland divided in loyalty. Piqued club authorities questioned the viability of the tussle and whether it was doing any good to the cause of swimming in the country. The tussle ignited a trail of fascinating letters between some of these clubs and Olympic officials in Lausanne. For instance, in March 1938, the hands of the NSA were strengthened when Calcutta’s wonderfully named Hatkhola Club (established in 1920 and literally meaning ‘all embracing’ or ‘one that welcomes all’), expressed anger at the ‘high handed attitude’ of the IOA.18 The Hathkola Club is significant because it represented a significant stream of elite opinion in Calcutta. Its president, Sir Hari Sanker Paul, was the Mayor of the city and now its secretary wrote to the secretary of the IOC to complain that the domineering attitude of the IOA was affecting the country’s swimmers, sportsmen and women who were unwarranted casualties in the power rivalry. 19 It questioned if there was a way by which the IOA and the NSA could bury the hatchet and co-exist peacefully. It also suggested that there was a precedent in the way the All India Football Association led by Bengal ended a similar standoff against football bodies from the other provinces by helping the formation of the All India Football Federation in 1937. These steps revitalized and revolutionized Indian football and the way it was organized in the country. A similar solution, it was suggested, was possible if the obdurate IOA was willing to recognize the NSA and willing to treat it as a body eager to alter the miserable plight of Indian swimming. In case the face-off hardened, Indian swimming, it was lamented, would become the greatest casualty. As a Calcutta club, Hatkhola’s loyalty was firmly with the NSA, as is evident from the following letter to the secretary to the IOC:
In 1934, NSA of Calcutta applied to the F.I.N.A. for affiliation for the control of swimming in India and in 1936 at Berlin, the F.I.N.A. finally accepted the affiliation of the NSA. As the IOA is the forwarding agent (of swimmers) for the international contests, the NSA applied for affiliation to the IOA. I am sorry to inform you that their application has been rejected and the IOA on their own accord are going to hold the All India swimming trial on 28th and 29th May 1938 for selection of Indian swimmers for the 2nd Western Asiatic Games to be held in Palestine in June 1938, without the help of the NSA.20
It wasn’t just a question of which organization was more competent. Regional identity was a crucial marker in this battle. Hatkhola opposed the IOA because it believed that the IOA was vindictive towards Bengal; a point that its avid correspondent to the IOC emphasized by citing the ‘unfair’ treatment meted out to the Bengal Amateur Swimming Association. Though the Association consisted of some of the most eminent gentry from Calcutta and represented the interests of most swimmers and swimming associations of the province, the IOA had refused to recognize it. Interestingly, the unfair treatment meted out to Bengali swimming associations did not end at the pool. It also extended to athletic clubs, as is evident from the bitter experience of the Hatkhola Club:
Our club has both sections, swimming as well as athletics. Last year my boys joined the aquatic sports not registered with the Bengal Olympic Association (BOA). This year we applied for registration for our two walking competitions to the BOA and they informed us over phone that our club as well as the competitors would not be registered as our swimmers have joined the unregistered sporting body.21
The Hatkhola cause gathered strength because it had touched the sympathetic chord of unfair treatment to sportspersons. This was evident when the IOC wrote back saying that the club’s recommendation of setting up a separate governing body for each sport would be considered seriously. Encouraged by the IOC response, the club sent another letter demanding a series of clarifications, which were similar in nature to those asked for by the NSA a couple of years earlier:
1. Does the Bengal Olympic Association have the authority to refuse registration of a club and its competitors because they have aligned themselves with the NSA, which has been recognized by FINA as the governing body for swimming in India?
2. Is the affiliation of the NSA of India with FINA final and is it the only body which could select Indian swimmers for international contests?
3. Has the Indian Olympic Association any power to hold All India swimming trials for the second Western Asiatic Games after the NSA has been accepted by FINA?
4. Who has the authority to select Indian swimmers for the second Western Asiatic Games, the IOA or the NSA?22
The battle had reached an impasse and on the eve of the second Western Asiatic Games the two organizations—the national Olympic body and the ‘national’ swimming body—reached a temporary truce in the interests of Indian sport. In fact, it was a wise move on the part of the IOA to extend an olive branch to the NSA. The NSA on its part agreed that some of its policies needed to be altered to bring other provincial associations into the ambit of Indian swimming. However, the NSA also suggested that as it had already affiliated itself with FINA, there was no reason why the IOA shouldn’t recognize it as the sole arbiter of swimming in the country.
The NSA claim could have been sounder if it had been able to claim any achievement on the international stage beyond electing office bearers and writing letters to other provincial associations demanding recognition. The IOA, on the other hand, could point to solid achievements. It had organized a series of international sporting contests at home and arranged the sending of Indian sides to multiple Olympiads. It still enjoyed the support of the largest number of sports bodies in the country, including a good number within Bengal.
TO COMPETE OR NOT TO COMPETE:
TWO INDIANS AND THE IOC
As the waves gradually receded in the pools, the IOA found itself confronting another crisis—a stormier one, perhaps, with Pankaj Gupta, the legendary Bengali sports administrator, taking on Sondhi for his alleged assertions against Indian participation in the forthcoming 1940 Tokyo Olympic Games.23
Sondhi, it was revealed later, had suggested in certain quarters that India should not participate in the Games unless she was prepared to mount a strong challenge for the medals. Winning, Sondhi asserted, was very important, for it was the only way a nation was honoured on the Olympic stage. Gupta perceived this plea for improvement as a tirade against the Olympic movement and suggested to the IOC president that Sondhi be admonished for his insolent remarks. As secretary of the Bengal Hockey Federation, he informed the IOC that such statements by Sondhi, the national and international face of the IOA, were a cause for major embarrassment in the country and also dampened the spirits of Indian sportspersons training for the Games. The emerging Bengali sports media offered support to Gupta in his attempt to malign Sondhi and advocated a more vital role for Bengal in steering Olympic affairs in India.24
Reacting to Gupta’s remarks, the IOC president, Count Baillet Latour, returned the original letter to Sondhi and asked him to respond to the allegations. Sondhi, stung by the unfair criticism, responded to eac
h accusation in detail, clarifying the position of the IOA in the process. He sent Gupta a detailed response on 16 June 1939 and followed it up with a reply to the IOC the next day, firmly cementing his position as the rightful face of Olympism in India.25
His response to Gupta was firm and was full of quotes from the Olympic oath to prove his point. He cited the oath on multiple occasions to drive home his perspective. For example, the oath declares, ‘We swear that we will take part in the Olympic Games in loyal competition respecting the regulations which govern them and desirous of participating in them in the true spirit of sportsmanship for the honour of our country and for the glory of sport’. Sondhi emphasized the words, ‘honour of the country’ and suggested that these words represented the central tenet of the oath. ‘It is not a truism that no one can glorify sport who does not bring honor to his country.’26 He went on to affirm that while the IOC selected its members for the qualities it deemed essential to make them worthy members of the committee, it also expected its members to take the lead ‘even at the risk of advocating unpopular views’. He stressed that there were instances when non-participation in an Olympiad was essential to be better prepared for the next: 27
The International Olympic Committee is more vitally concerned in preaching the high ideals of real sportsmanship and in raising the general physical health of the peoples of countries than in merely taking part in the Games. Participation in the Games is important, but only because it tends to draw pointed attention to the necessity of physical improvement, and because it brings the youth of various nations together and provides opportunities for international understanding. It would be quite in order for a member of the International Olympic Committee to advise his country to refrain from taking part in some particular event at the Olympic Games so that the country may husband its resources for improving sports generally and thus reach a higher standard in the next Olympic Games.28
Olympics-The India Story Page 6
