Abhinav Bindra: India needs to focus on grassroots development

Abhinav Bindra, the 2008 Olympic gold-medallist, underlines the importance of developing a conducive sporting culture to help create "sporting champions of tomorrow."

Looking ahead: Abhinav Bindra says investing in the grassroots is important to help create "sporting champions of tomorrow." File Photo: PTI

Developing a sports culture in India and enhancing grassroots development is important to “create champions of tomorrow,” Abhinav Bindra has said.

“Having a sports culture in a country like ours is extremely important. If we are serious about sports, we need to focus on grassroots, because grassroots is where we need [to] invest our efforts to create sporting champions of tomorrow,” Bindra, the 2008 Olympic gold-medallist, said.

‘Brimming with talent’

He was speaking at the scholarship awards function for Sports for All , a school-level competition. “Our partnership with SFA is a reiteration of the same. This platform is brimming with potential talent which, if trained in the right manner, can win laurels for the country,” said Bindra.

Read | Abhinav Bindra receives ISSF's highest honour

He was in Mumbai to scout for young talent from SFA to train in his high-performance centres.

Ananya Budhivant (shooting) and Yohaan Panjuani (football) were among seven Mumbai school children who were picked to train at the Abhinav Bindra Targeting Performance Centre (ABTP). The others were: Joshua Eapen, Saheb Sodhi (both tennis), Deviah Jain (badminton), Reva Ranjan Kotian (karate) and Sahil Atul Manjrekar (mixed martial arts).

Also present at the function was former India tennis star Somdev Devvarman.