TOPS spent ₹17.9 crore on foreign training of athletes before Paris Olympics: Report

Neeraj Chopra won gold at Federation Cup with an 82.27m throw. PTI

The Mission Olympic Cell (MOC) through its Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS) has reportedly spent ₹17.9 crore on foreign training of athletes going to the Paris Olympic Games. With the onus of bringing glory to the country, athletes have chosen to prepare outside of India and found support from the government towards such exposure.

As per Times of India, of this ₹17.9 crore, ₹6.25 crore has been spent on track and field athletes, ₹5.77 crore on badminton players, ₹3.83 crore on shooters, ₹ 1.57 crore on tennis players, ₹1.17 crore on para-athletes, ₹55 lakhs on wrestlers followed by weightlifters (₹42 lakhs), boxers (₹36 lakhs), archers (₹20 lakhs) and swimmers (₹15 lakhs).

Individually, Tokyo Olympics gold medallist Neeraj Chopra has trained in South Africa, Finland, Germany and Turkey at the cost of ₹48.76 lakhs with 176 days spent abroad since December 2023.

2016 Rio Olympics silver medallist and 2020 Tokyo Olympics bronze medallist PV Sindhu has trained in Germany for 36 days at a cost of ₹26.60 lakhs.

Weightlifter Mirabai Chanu, silver medallist in Tokyo, has spent over two months in St. Louis, USA, to recover and then get competition fit by billing ₹42.54 lakhs.

Elsewhere, training for Rohan Bopanna, who will represent India in men’s doubles tennis, has racked a bill of ₹1.03 crore to ensure the 44-year-old has been able to get the right physios and coaches.

Other expenses include: Sharath Kamal (₹6.20 lakh), Vinesh Phogat (₹33.07 lakh), Avinash Sable, Parul Choudhary, Harmilan Bains (₹1.79 crore), Nishad Kumar, Mariyappan Thangavelu (₹39.83 lakh), Lovlina Borgohain (₹4.41 lakh) and Lakshya Sen (₹9.33 lakh).

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