July 27th 2012 – the beginning of four yearly cycle of sports extravaganza – the start of the London 2012 Olympic Games. The whole of Britain held its breath, a state of national nervousness ensued. Could Britain hold the Olympic Games without any hitch and match the spectacular success of Beijing Olympics four years earlier? British prestige and British standing in the whole world was at stake. Only a few weeks earlier G4S, the company entrusted with the responsibility of ensuring safety and security of the Games, informed the Organising Committee that it didn’t have enough manpower to ensure security. That was a major blow to the Organising Committee. The government became extremely jittery and the British Parliament went into emergency session to consider this grave situation and save the British face. The government after an acrimonious debate decided to call in the Army to tackle the situation and within a matter of days the Army took over the responsibility with war time zeal.
For 17 days, London 2012 Olympic Games and then two weeks of Paralympics were held in Britain and the world witnessed the sheer extravaganza of both of these games. The logistics of both of these Games were mind boggling. In Olympic Games, more than 150 countries participated with more than 10,500 athletes. Over 21,000 accredited media personnel descended in London to cover the Games. There were more than 2,900 technical staff and 6,000 officials working flat out to facilitate smooth running of the events. Over 8.8 million tickets were available for the Games. More than 70,000 volunteers and 100,000 contractors were involved to help out 20 million spectator journeys. Over 14 million meals were served at the Games; 45,000 meals were served every day in the Olympic Village alone. More than four billion people worldwide watched the Games on their televisions. The total cost for this Olympic Games came to 9.8 billion pound sterling.
One year on, July 27th, 2013. Britain is revisiting that spectacular success of the London 2012 Olympics. Even the IOC president Jacques Rogge stated that Britain’s London 2012 Games should be the model for future hosts. For Britain, it was not only the organisational success but unprecedented sporting success also.
Let us look at the sheer spectacle of the opening ceremony that Danny Boyle master minded. He mesmerised 100,000 spectators on the opening night by creating a sort of virtual world right in front of their eyes. The 18th century industrial revolution in Britain was shown where enormous factories with smoke belching chimneys popped up from the ground. Ordinary lives were shown where farmers were ploughing fields, ladies and children were having fun in the merry-go-rounds beside their thatched cottages. Before the spectators could absorb everything, the scene was changed. There were wind turbines generating electricity, large hospital beds of the National Health Service (NHS) where hundreds of patients were treated. Then a large circle of fire ball started rising up into the night sky right over the heads of the spectators and then four more circles joined in to make the logo of the Olympic Games of five interweaving circles. The whole thing was mind boggling and just surreal.
The sporting success for Britain was spectacular too. Never before Britain could manage to come third (with 29 gold medal) in the Olympic medal table, just behind America (46 gold) and China (38 gold), but ahead of Russia (24 gold). If the question of population proportionality was taken into consideration, then Britain was well ahead of America. (American population was five times bigger and so they should have won 145 gold in proportion to British gold medals; whereas they won only 46 gold! China’s haul was even less impressive if population was considered.
Success in sport, like in any other field, does not come about by sheer luck or chance. An athlete competes against the best athletes from competing countries producing best athletes, who had been trained with best available facilities and encouragement. Each and every serious athlete had to work extremely hard for full four years just to reach the standards to compete – let alone win. They had to sacrifice a lot of things in life to prepare for these Games, had almost singular devotion and dream to succeed. No wonder when an athlete wins a gold medal there is more than 75 per cent chance that he or she will cry right in front of cameras from sheer emotions of success than smile out of pleasure.
Now where does Bangladesh stand in this global competition in Olympics? It is a very depressing story indeed. The country did not manage to get a single medal of any description in Olympics in more than 40 years of independence. With the vast population of around 160 million, it is not a very flattering statistic. Even a small country like Bahrain with a highly conservative Muslim population of only 1.2 million managed to win a bronze medal in London 2012. Why is then Bangladesh spectacularly failing? Does the government of Bangladesh encourage and facilitate sports and games in the country? The answer is a big NO. But the government does not miss any opportunity to misappropriate whatever little fund it allocates to sports.
In the London 2012 Olympic Games, seven ‘athletes’ from Bangladesh came to London flanked by an entourage of 73 members led by the Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her extended family, her close cabinet members as well as the Bangladesh Olympic Committee Members. The statement ‘seven athletes flanked by the PM’ was a misnomer – the real situation was that seven athletes were just the add-on to the ‘Honourable’ PM’s tour to London 2012 Olympic Games. How these seven ‘athletes’ were chosen, with what preparations, no one knows. The remaining 66-member band of fat cats probably swallowed up lion’s share of whatever small budget there was for sports in Bangladesh. It is hardly surprising that the athletes did achieve nothing; they even failed to go beyond the ‘Heat’ stage.
The anniversary celebration that took place in London was not about bragging about the past successes; but preparations for the future in Rio Olympics in 2016. All the top ranking Olympians of the world from Usain Bolt to Michael Phelps along with British athletes like Jessica Ennis, Mo Farah and others competed to test their present state of fitness and preparations. The Olympic Committees of all major nations were keeping hawk eyes on each other’s preparations. In Britain each and every discipline had been allocated a budget according to the likelihood of success. The athletes are trained by seasoned athletes. Seeing their level of commitment and hard work, it is not surprising that they come out winning medals. Conversely, it is not surprising to see that Bangladeshi athletes achieve nothing as sports’ fund is being whittled away by politicians having family pleasure and leisure.
Source: Bd news24
