To mark its launch, Sports Cult, a sports promotion firm, conducted a national tournament for boys and girls under 12 years of age along with the All India Tennis Association (AITA) at Surya Academy, Bachupally, recently. For a first time foray of this kind, the turnout was impressive with 64 boys and girls from Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana taking part.
Incidentally, the announcement of Sports Cult’s formation was made just a few days before the national tournament. The objective was to develop a sports culture in communities.
Bobby Reddy, MD & CEO, says that in addition to the above facility, it had opened two more at Boduppal and Miyapur that would focus on cricket, tennis, skating and basketball. The coaching and playing schemes would be open to all ages with a view to broad-base sports in the neighbourhood.
“Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) policy on sports lacks clarity with governments keen to spend money on building infrastructure but not in maintaining them,” he says. With real estate prices going through the roof, his approach seems more practical in that it leases privately owned lands or those lying idle with government organisations.
“Our vision for 2020 is to have 100,000 participants in 400 neighbourhood facilities, two per cent of whom would be from underprivileged sections,” Reddy says, adding there were plans to branch out to Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi and Mumbai with the larger goal of building a sports ecosystem in the country.
“Sport is not seen as an industry and levels of professionalism are poor,” he says. The company’s motto says, ‘Give wings to your talent,” towards which it had developed sports programmes that are tailor-made for schools.
In India non-profit association, such as CSR initiatives, is more common with sport. For-profit investment includes sponsorships, owning leagues and franchises. Reddy is enthused that the commercial success of the Indian Premier League (IPL) in cricket has led to a surge of similar commercial formats in other sports. “These are good signs,” Reddy notes.
Sports Cult has already invested Rs. 2 crore, with committed angel funding to the extent of Rs. 3 to 4 crore, yet to be utilised. With sports in general perennially short of funds, this venture could fill some of the gaps.
