Football is an awful state in India. The country has not even qualified to play world cup where small countries from Latin America and Europe are playing.The country's rank is going down year after year. Sports ministry should take time bound action to find out the reasons for the sorry state of the game and take immediate measures to improve the pitches, coaches, infrastructure and playing skills of players. Baichung Bhutia, undoubtedly the greatest football player of the country, should be involved in this task. He should be fully supported by the government in this task.

What President country wants

President of India should be a well learned erudite scholar widely known with simple living habits and respected by people all over India. Among the past presidents Dr S. Radharkrishna and to some extent Abdul Kalam fit in this category. President should not belong any political party and he should not be a current minister. President's role comes into play only when there is a hung parliament. Non party man will make an unbiased decision at this time. Presently governors are chosen from party men and they are invariable found to perform as per the requirement of their masters. Such a thing should not be allowed to happen with president. His style of living should be simple similar to any middle class citizen. He should live in a moderately sized house of around 1500-2000 sq feet. Number of servants should be restricted to a bare minimum. He should contribute to development of country by giving suggestions for improvement to the ministers including prime minister. He should have a role in the selection of Election commissioner, Vigilance chief and other constitutional posts. If he finds misuse of CBI by the government he should immediately caution the prime minister.  He should make a foreign trip only if it bring tangible benefits to the country. He should give report of the visit to the parliament. Viewed under this context Pranab Mukherjee is a poor choice for president. We should look at a wider area covering academcians and scholars for this purpose. 

Helpful Suggestions: What President country wants

Helpful Suggestions: What President country wants: President of India should be a well learned erudite scholar widely known with simple living habits and respected by people all over India. ...

Letters to the Editor sent to Deccan Herald - Congress nominee for president´s po by Narayanan Balasubramanian

Letters to the Editor sent to Deccan Herald - Congress nominee for president´s po by Narayanan Balasubramanian

Presidnent's post for Pranab

Congress spokesperson says that Pranab Mukherji is indispensable for UPA II and cannot be spared for President's post. Then why don't they appoint him as Prime minister. A good manager is one who delgates responsibilities and decision making authority to his subordinates so that work will go on smoothly even in his absence. Pranab seems to have failed in this respect if he is considered indispensible. Government should not depend on any individual however efficient he may be.

Defeat against Bangladesh

With the king of bowling at our disposal, any total lower than 300 cannot be defended in ODI. This amply demonstrated by Bangladesh when they defeated India in yesterday's ODI. Some blame for this must also go to Sachin Tendulkar as he slowed down the rate of scoring after reaching 80 and even conceded a maidan in his anxiety to get 100th 100. Why is it that India cannot develop wicket taking bowlers while Pakistan has a crop of talented fast as well as spin bowlers? Instead of hosting IPL matches, BCCI should focus its energy and attention on improving the quality of pitches and training facilities for bowlers so that at least half a dozen quality bowlers are developed.

World cup and India

India 's showing in the world cup so far does not inspire confidence even to their die hard supporters. Their bowling, fielding and running between wickets is abysmal compared to other countries. In bowling, only Zhahirkhan looks like taking wickets. Harbhajan singh is more keen in containing batsman than in taking wickets. With such a poor bowling attack, even total above 300 cannot be defended. Given the size of the country and population, it is surprising that we are unable to develop half a dozen genuine fast bowlers while Pakistan has a good crop of fast bowlers. Even in batting, only first 4-5 batsman have come good and 6 and 7th have been a total failure. Our tail enders are not even able to last 5- 6 balls. Inspite of building good score in 40-42 overs we were short by 30-40 runs from the target. The coach and caption are responsible for guiding the players under such situations. the players should be asked tobide their time by taking singles and twos, keep the wickets in tact and go for ambitious strokes only after 47th over. Dhoni has been a failure in batting, captency and team selection.The selectors and coach should be made accountable for team's performance. BCCI should stop promoting IPL, as it kills the skills in a cricketer and lays more emphasis on money making. Instead it should put in more time, money and efforts in devloping genuine fast bowlers, wicket taking spinniners and improving fielding to world standards. Only then we can aspire to win world cup.