HOCKEY INDIA: A new beginning?

Recently Indian hockey has been looking down the barrel, but after the former IHF was desolved by the IOC there has been some good news from both in and off the field. Both seniors and juniors won the Asia cup, the 2010 World Cup men’s hockey championship will be held in Delhi, and the IHF will be known as Hockey India.
All these news seems exciting but we know the way to regain our pride is not easy, so to know what needs to be done to do so I met former Olympian Ashok Dhyanchand. He says that no doubt Indian players are talented but they should concentrate on basic skills like traping, hitting, penalty corner etc. Talking on Astroturf he said, after its advent in 1976 the Asian style hockey has been affected drastically, India & Pakistan could never come out of this because the cost of laying these facilities and maintaining them is beyond the capacity of developing nations like us. This was the conspiracy of European countries which wanted to break the monopoly of the Asian countries. Today the speed in hockey might have increased but the charm and craft of hockey is missing which has given us empty stadiums. He supported the idea of hockey being played on different surfaces like tennis, it would add variety to the game which would ultimately be profitable.
Sharing his thoughts on Chak De, he said hockey in India could have been revitalized with the hype created by the movie, but the federation let that opportunity pass by. We need money, glamour, public recognition like cricket to recycle hockey out of the dustbin. For this prompt & effective measures should be taken by Hockey India. He suggested the idea of an IPL like tournament in hockey which would attract corporate houses as well as youth to take interest in our national game.
Later on the question, why our junior players have been winning all the major tournaments but the same is not being transformed at the senior level. His take was quite shocking, he said once after playing for India at the under 19 level the pride and passion is lost amongst the players, they get jobs, plots & other government facilities and they loose their focus from hockey. But he was quite confident that things will change as now hockey will now be looked after by veteran players & not by politicians & definitely our team will be on the medal podium in the 2012 olympics.