Why India does not produce a lot of world-class sportspersons?

I have always wondered why India, with its huge population does not produce even a handful of world-class sports-persons. All of us know that more than 1/3 of India lives below poverty line, but more than 1/4 of India constitutes middle-class. But still we struggle to get even one gold medal at the Olympic games in individual sports. If you analyze even a little bit, the reasons are pretty obvious.

Firstly, most people in India who can afford to spend on getting their children in sports do not think that their kids can pursue sports as a career. While it is true to some extent, see what Sania Mirza has achieved even without getting into top 25? While Ramanathan Krishnan was our first world-class player in tennis, it is Ramesh Krishnan and Vijay Amritraj who made Tennis popular in India and Sania Mirza has taken it to the next level. But no one has reached Ramanathan's level in India even now when it comes to Tennis.

Secondly, the adulation that the players get even when they achieve results classified mediocre in world standards is what I consider the dampener. Sania Mirza never managed to cross the 30s ranking so far. In Badminton, whole country came to know that there is one great game called shuttle badminton when Prakash Padukone won the all England championship. Gopichand did it again and we had some really good players who played at the highest level including Sania Nehwal though she still has miles to go before she can reach Prakash or Gopi's level.

Thirdly, in India we don't have a complete ecosystem for all kinds of sports. For a sport like tennis, we need good coaches, trainers, experts in sports medicine, excellent courts to practice and above all good amount of money to invest to participate in world-class events before the players start earning enough to fund it themselves. We need a lot of sports entrepreneurs who will spot and groom the right talent from an early age. With most of our sports administration in the hands of politicians, I don't see much progress on this front unless the professionals who are funded privately step in. Prakash & Gopi opening badminton academies is a welcome move in that direction, but it has to happen in all sports.

Last but not the least, the key ingredient that is missing in most Indians is the killer-instinct to win. One Mr. Rathore won a silver medal in an Olympics and he never produced anything better after that. He seems to be satisfied with his achievement. In contrast, players like Serena Williams or a Pete Sampras kept on winning Grand slams, but they had the hunger for more. We Indians feel satisfied even before we reach the top forget about even remaining there even for a while. My sincere guess is that till we get a critical mass of very successful sports persons, the situation will remain like this.

In summary, it is the lack of killer instinct, absence of conducive ecosystem, inability to handle the fame well and social perception about sports as a career are some of the things that are responsible for India not producing good number of world-class sports persons proportional to our population. Things are changing for the better, but we still have a long way to go.