New Delhi: Sunil Gavaskar’s ‘The CHAMPS Foundation’, has come to the aid of ailing hockey Olympian Mohinder Pal Singh. The foundation which is into a lot of other activities also helps out sportspersons facing financial crunch. Sunil Gavaskar has always tried to help out sportspersons in need.
Mohinder Pal Singh is better known as MP Singh. He has been suffering from kidney ailment and the 58-year-old is on dialysis waiting for a donor for transplant.
When contacted, Gavaskar spoke about how the idea of The CHAMPS Foundation (Caring, Helping, Assisting, Motivating, Promoting Sportspersons) came up.
“I had been reading in the media about the hard times that our earlier Olympians and (international) medallists were facing. Most of their problems happened after their retirement,” Gavaskar told this agency. “The information about Shri MP Singh’s health also came about thanks to the print media,” the iconic Gavaskar added.
MP Singh was an integral part of the Indian hockey team that took part in the 1988 Seoul Olympics. He played alongside likes of Mohammed Shahid, MM Somaya, Jude Felix, Pargat Singh to name a few.
The primary reason behind setting up the foundation was that there wasn’t any specific organisation that helped former stars, said Gavaskar. He added that it is the responsibility of everyone to help these sportspersons who have given their all for the nation.
“There are many Foundations for Education, Health, Child and Senior citizens. However, there is none for former international sportspersons. So I thought of setting up a foundation with a personal contribution,” Gavaskar said.
“We then organised a double wicket tournament with the members of the 1983 World Cup team. It was partnered by industrialists or corporate heads with their companies making a donation to the corpus of the fund,” informed Gavaskar.
Till date, ‘The CHAMPS Foundation’ has helped 21 former players with monthly assistance. It has also taked care of their medical expenses.
“We would like to help more but we get to know about an international who is struggling to make ends meet only when the media does a story. I wish more such people contacted the foundation,” Gavaskar said. “We can be contacted via email on info@champsindia.org or +919967085558 or https://champsindia.Org,” the ‘Little Master’ added.
Gavaskar was asked how the foundation checks the credibility of people seeking financial assistance. He said that there are systems in place. “The Foundation has friends who do the background check. Then the decision to assist or not is taken,” informed Gavaskar.