Very few people remember where Milkha Singh earned his “Flying Sikh” title. It was during an Indo Pakistan meet in Lahore in the late fifties Mikha had not yet stormed Rome then but had endeared himself to the crowd with a sterling performance against Pakistan’s sprint star Abdul Khaliq.
Those were indeed the glorious days of athletics in Indie. Milkha ‘was on the threshold of a greater career and Amrit Pal Singh and Sri Chand Ram among others were kings in their own right while Gurbachan Singh was blossoming out as an all-round athlete with a penchant for the high hurdles. If Milkha captured the hearts at Rome Olympics Gurbachan Singh was striding firmly towards his goal in the Tokyo Olympics of 1964.
Pakistan too was riding the crest during those days. Athletics was a hero to sustain the interest Ghulam Razik that fine hurdler was a matchless gure while Mohammed Iqbal dominated the hammer throw event in the Asian Games and snatched the best in the Commonwealth Games. Gurbarak Shah the colorful athlete who was involved in many a duel in the steep lechase event with India’s Pan Singh and Maria Ram javelin throwers Mohammed Nawaz and Allah Daad were all part of a splendid bunch who kept the Pakistan flag flying.
Those were the days of cinder and grass tracks not always well maintained. The accompanying facilities too were primitive but the standards attained by these athletes from India and Pakistan were generally much higher than the prevailing standards on synthetic tracks with all the sophisticated trappings.
There is however considerable differences in the standards of the two countries. Whereas Pakistan have revived their interest in athletics with some high-tech coaching as part of their preparation for the SAF Games in Islamabad two years ago athletics in India is on the downgrade.
The effect of good coaching was manifest during the SAF Games when Ghulam Abbas clocked 50.68 seconds for the 400 meters hurdles the best ever in the subcontinent. ‘Their quarter miler too showed tremendous promise while Nadir Khan finished ahead of Vijay Kumaran in the half-mile event home in a very creditable time of 1:48.38.
Interestingly Pakistan somewhat like India has always managed to keep a close touch with the 800 and 1500 meters events. While India had Barua Sri Ram for the half mile and Edward Sequeira for the 1500 meters Pakistan’s interest was looked after by Siddiqui and Md. Younis.
The training also showed up during the Beijing Asian Games last year when Ghulam Abbas won the gold medal in the 400 meters hurdles with a tremendous effort after the last hurdle. Barring Deena Ram’s silver a superb effort in the steeplechase India did not have anything to boast about in the men’s section.
‘The exercise in comparison is basically to point out the benefits to be accrued from a revival of an Indo-Pak home and away series in athletics. These contests helped the countries then they can do so now also.
Indian athletes need competition badly. Such has been the schedule over the past two or three years that they train for one coaching camp to another and generally falter at the slightest suggestion of competition. It was the case with quite 2 few athletes in Beijing.
It is competition at their own level and slightly above that will boost the standards. There is no point in pitting them against world class athletes in Permit Meets. An Indo-Pak meet on the other hand will not only help revive spectator interest in athletics but also help raise the standards.
Article extracted from this publication >> September 27, 1991
