Relating performance to India's population nonsense: Thipsay

"We need proper facilities for people to play sports. Relating everything to population is nonsense as in India though population is one billion, only 2 per cent have the opportunity to play sports," said Thipsay at the launch function of India's first sports anthem "Cheer for Champions" by Vicks today.

The chess ace also pointed out that when Garry Kasparov became a world champion in 1985 for the first time, he was asked how Russia kept producing world champions one after the other and his answer was when 4.5 million players played the game, one of them becoming a world champion was not a surprise.

"Sports are good for health and the future of a nation. Anthem has its own merit. The key role it plays is in motivating sports people and making them behave. Anthem played before start of play is a reminder of ethics and culture of sports and helps in maintaining discipline," Thipsay said at the function organised in association with the Sports Journalists Association of Mumbai.

The sports anthem has been composed by Ranjit Bharot and sung by playback singer Javed Ali. It is being supported by former India cricket captains Dilip Vengsarkar and Anil Kumble, billiards ace Prakash Paddukone and ex-national hockey and football skippers Dhanraj Pillai and I M Vijayan, respectively. MORE