Games are meant for Youth

It was really nice experience winning bronze medal in Gymnastics. This achievement remains a high point of inspiration for me even today. Now let me take your attention to another incident of similar type but with contrasting fate. I Participated in many activities during Junior High school studies. I completed matriculation from another school and went to yet another school for Senior Secondary Education. This was the time when I got some fondness towards speeches and debates. I was a bit shy initially to take up the challenge to speak in front of many listeners, but the bronze medal glory helped me out to overcome this hiccup. I got the confidence that anything can be initiated at any point of time irrespective of whether you’ve done/experienced it earlier or not. During that one year I participated in N number of debate/speech competitions at school level. I had one a couple of titles there too.
A big occasion came up for me, when I participated in a district level speech competition from my school. There were participants from almost all schools in the district. A fantastic stage to showcase my abilities was there. It turned out to be a tough competition, but I got the edge over others on the basis of my unique style of delivering speech. I got selected to compete on the topic with the bests from all over the country, to be held at Allahabad.
This was yet another big moment for me. I was really eager to step out of my town and see the world for the first time. As it happens with us whenever we see a window we try to visualize beyond that and start dreaming. I am perplexed whether to call this tendency of human being a weakness or strength. Since visualizing attitude of human being must have been a key factor in the development of human civilization up to this date, so it’s strength. But in many cases it seems to be a weak point as in this case.
In contrast to my day dreams there was something else in store for me. I was an Intermediate final year student at that time. The dates of practical exams being conducted by U P Board were around the corner, but no date was fixed, not even a tentative date. I went up to my principal and informed him with my selection for the national meet and requested him to permit me to participate in the same event scheduled to be held at Allahabad few days later.
My hard luck! Mr. Principal refused to provide any favor in case of practical exams if, by chance, conducted during my absence. The risk was big for me. Not appearing in practical meant loss of one academic year.
Mr. Principal did not have courage to support a young student for making his dream come true. We know our system. N number of loopholes are there to crack a possibility for making something happen. But alas! That is never done for noble cause, to make a bold step for a better future but to discourage and demolish constitutional pillars.
Mr. Principal was not bold enough to take a decision to encourage a young guy for a noble cause as Mr. N D Joshi did in the earlier case. Mr. Principal, being an old man, was not as enthusiastic as young leader N D Joshi. Mr. N D Joshi, being one of the youngest in his staff was leading as a headmaster in the school. An agitated blood was instrumental to lead a young team to success. On the other hand tired & old blood in veins of Mr. Principal was not allowing him to take risk even for a legitimate reason.
At last I can say Games are meant for young blood and should be led by youths. Why am I raising these points here today? An obvious question gets raised here. Following Beijing Olympics 2008 I came up with this kind of conclusions. Why do I think so? I’ll explain few points in following post……