The Indian Olympic Association (IOA) announced Amul as the second sponsor for the Indian contingent for the Olympics in London, after Samsung, and declared that the entire fund of Rs. 1 crore from the deal would be spent on the sportspersons.
In a press conference here on Monday, the acting president of the IOA, Prof. Vijay Kumar Malhotra said that each qualified athlete, including the 16 hockey players to be selected for the London Games, would get at least Rs. 2 lakh each.
Samsung had paid Rs. 50 lakh to IOA, after spending the other 50 lakh on the athletes.
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Prof. Malhotra said that he expected about 65 athletes to qualify for the London Games, and promised to spend the Rs. 1.5 crore with the IOA from the sponsorship deals from the two companies, on them.
So far, 29 players had qualified for the Olympics, four in archery, eight in athletics, four in boxing, 11 in shooting and two swimmers, apart from the men's hockey team.
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“We expect qualification in tennis, badminton, table tennis, boxing, wrestling, apart from judo, rowing and weightlifting”, said Prof. Malhotra.
He said that a monitoring committee meeting would be held on March 1, to decide the course of action for the qualified athletes as far as their training and acclimatisation to the conditions in London was concerned.
The president of each of the federation which has a qualified athlete, apart from one sportsperson from that discipline, are expected to attend the meeting to chalk out the programme.
Prof. Malhotra revealed that the organisers of the London Games would give £30,000 to the Indian contingent towards preparation in London, while the Sports Authority of India (SAI) would take care of the overall expenditure under the Operation Excellence scheme.
The IOA president assured that the competition and ornamental kits for the athletes would have the best design.
He said that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) allowed 11 heads for sponsors, and hoped that there would be more sponsors for the Indian contingent, following the entry of electronics and food industry.
Amul keen
The Managing Director of Amul, R.S. Sodhi, said that the milk company with a turnover of Rs. 12,000 crore and owned by 31 lakh farmers of Gujarat, known under the tag, the ‘Taste of India' was keen to promote the “Talent of India”', by associating itself with the Olympics.
The company had ventured into the other spheres of sport, like the cricket World Cup and Formula One recently.
The secretary general of the IOA, Randhir Singh, six-time Olympian and Asian Games gold medallist in trap shooting, recalled his experience in the 1960s when the athletes had to deposit Indian currency to claim the foreign exchange of five dollars per day, and thanked the former Prime Ministers Rajiv Gandhi and Atal Behari Vajpayee for making a big change in the world of Indian sports.
He also appreciated the work of Anil Khanna, the secretary general of All India Tennis Association (AITA) and the Chairman of the finance committee of the IOA, for bringing another sponsor on board, the Olympic family.
The IOA reiterated that its executive committee would be meeting on March 2, as announced, to discuss a suitable reply for the IOC that had queried the status of the IOA president, Suresh Kalmadi, in the national Olympic Committee.