New Delhi: Indian Olympic Association (IOA) President Narinder Dhruv Batra on Thursday urged athletes and officials to be responsible while travelling with an eye on the current situation of the coronavirus pandemic.
In his letter to IOA members, Batra reminded the quarantine rules applicable on the athletes and officials going abroad for any training or for the tournaments amid the pandemic.
As the Tokyo Olympics is less than three months away, IOA does not want any athlete to suffer because of the pandemic.
“The dates for the Olympics are approaching fast and athletes along with help of Federation/SAI are making all efforts to provide the best training and competitions to the athletes for the participation in Olympics. But due to ongoing increase in the numbers of covid-19 cases, there is fear of infection to the athletes and officals in the camps and to those who are planning for travelling abroad,” Batra stated in the letter.
“It becomes the responsibility of each one of us to be very careful while travelling. We must restrict our movements. Those travelling abroad must know the local laws of quarantine. It is informed that in some countries the foreign travellers have to go into quarantine for 14 days.
“In that case the athletes will not be able to train for such long time, which can totally jeopardise the training of the athletes. It is, therefore, the (responsibility of the) federation along with the athletes and the officials to do proper due diligence before travelling abroad,” it added.
More than 3 lakh new COVID-19 cases and over 2,000 deaths were reported in India on Thursday, a record-high since the pandemic broke out last year.
As per the Union Health Ministry, as many as 3,14,835 new COVID-19 cases and 2,104 deaths were reported, taking the total cases to 1,59,30,965, including 22,91,428 active cases.
Batra further said athletes should be fully aware of the consequences of Covid-19 and they should be “very conscious and careful” before travelling.
“We must own full responsibility of travelling and the athletes must be fully aware of the consequences that may arise due to the ongoing pandemic worldwide. Once again, I take this opportunity to advise/request you to be very conscious and careful before taking the decision to travel,” the letter read.
“We wish you the best of luck and we (President, Secretary General and Chair Preparations Committee) are fully behind your endeavour to achieve and target for the best in the upcoming Olympics,” it added.