TOPS is useless scheme with no future: WFI prez

NEW DELHI:The Government’s ambitious Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS) has come under scathing criticism from Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) president Brij Bhushan Singh, who has termed it as an “impediment to the country’s medal chances at the 2016 Rio Olympics”.

Sabi Hussain

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, November 4

The Government’s ambitious Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS) has come under scathing criticism from Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) president Brij Bhushan Singh, who has termed it as an “impediment to the country’s medal chances at the 2016 Rio Olympics”.

Singh has been miffed with the poor implementation of TOPS. WFI is the third NSF after the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) and Archery Association of India (AAI) that has publicly voiced its anger against the TOPS, which has been marred by allegations of administrative red-tapism.

“It’s a useless scheme with no future. It will not only ruin wrestling, but other Olympics disciplines as well. It’s an impediment to the country’s Olympics success in Rio. The Ministry officials are only busy with collecting proposals from athletes, but when it comes to the actual release of funds, they go into hiding. TOPS is nothing but a complete waste of time,” Singh told The Tribune.

Singh said that the federations were unable to understand the modalities of the scheme despite attending so many meetings of the identification committee.

“Once an athlete applies for the TOPS funding, the Ministry burdens him with endless paper work and queries. An athlete should focus on his training and not on keeping a track of his proposal? Till today, I am unable to understand what the scheme is all about. I would say the scheme never took off. This is the most unfortunate part about it,” Singh said.

“The Rio Olympics are round the corner and this scheme has only multiplied the problems of the athletes. They are not getting any benefit,” he added.

National badminton coach Pullela Gopichand, who is a member of the TOPS identification committee, admitted that there were some “grey areas” which needed to be addressed urgently. Though he did not get into the details, he said that the lengthy paperwork was one major concern among the athletes.

“There should be more clarity about the scheme. A smooth implementation of the scheme would have worked. What is important to understand here is that if a player requires something, he/she would be provided with it. TOPS is just a big name. There are other schemes to get the funding,” Gopichand said.

TOPS chairman Anurag Thakur and key member Abhinav Bindra have already resigned from the TOPS committee due to different reasons. But sources say that the two were unhappy with the poor implementation of the scheme and did not want their names associated with a failed and controversial project. The Sports Minister has called an urgent meeting of the TOPS committee on November 6 to review the scheme.