From Sudha Murty to Zerodha's Rainmatter, it's funding spring in sports, thanks to India Inc and CSR

Dipa Karmarkar

Sports has turned heads of India Inc that is now looking at ways to back athletes. A lot of them are doing so by spending higher on sports through corporate social responsibility which seems to be spawning Olympic dreams especially in the Indian track and field.

From the first CSR funding for para sports to a venture firm granting funds to a sports organisation for building capacity, sports-bound funding through the CSR route saw many a first last year.

The 19 para athletes representing India in the Rio Games became an 84-member strong team winning a record 29 medals in Paris. India took a big leap. So did CSR funding by India Inc, according to Deepthi Bopaiah, chief executive of GoSports Foundation, a non-profit organisation that gets 80 percent of its funding from CSR donations.

"We came up with the first programme that actually supported para athletes in a structured manner. Before that, there were individuals or the government funding athletes for competitions. But there was no end-to-end support," she said.

It was IndusInd Bank that came forward to back the first CSR funding for para sports.

But the journey wasn't easy, recalled Bopaiah. "Many questioned us on why we were putting money into fencing, taekwondo, canoeing or para sports."

For Bopaiah, it was all about broadening the base of players that reach the Olympics. "There are about 30 to 33 events with 400-odd medals on offer. We (India) are sending only 100 people in some 11-12 sports. We don't have cyclists, there are so many events where we don't even participate. But we backed someone like Dipa Karmakar when nobody thought India could have a gymnast in the finals of Olympics. Karmakar missed winning a medal by a whisker. Nobody also thought fencing could be a sport that we could work with, and then came Bhavani Devi who became the first fencer to qualify for the Olympics."

Increased funding

A lot of this confidence came from the increased CSR funding, Bopaiah said. "When we started off in 2013, we were barely supporting 20-25 athletes. Today, we have around 211 athletes. Public-private partnerships are increasing. Funding is increasing. Sports used to barely get Rs 50-60 crore when CSR had started. Now, it is up to about 1-1.5 percent of the overall CSR budget that comes to sport. It's still very small, but you can see the amount of impact that has happened on ground. So if that needle moves to 5 percent, then you're talking about some amazing change that can happen for sports."

On the average, about Rs 248 crore, accounting 1.8 percent of total CSR funds, was spent annually by listed Indian companies on sports, according to an Economic Times report. Same was the case in FY23 when the total CSR amount stood at Rs 15,600 crore out of which Rs 280 crore was spent on sports.

Bopaiah also noted that sports organisations like theirs are customising programs for corporates. She gave the example of HDFC Bank that funded many women empowerment programs but never had anything in sport.

"We structured a women in sport program and chose six young athletes and one of them qualified for the Paris Olympics. While HDFC Bank is still doing their broad themes of inclusion of women, we're doing it through sport. We curate programs based on areas that corporates want to get into," she said.

GoSports is also pushing from a policy standpoint is that if every company can set aside 1 percent CSR funds for sports irrespective of whether it's development of sports, elite sport, emerging sport or Olympic sport, then it can immediately shift the needle, she added.

One of a kind

Out of their total CSR funds, companies are spending 5-10 percent towards sports, the GoSports CEO said. "But in CSR, there is one rule that only 5 percent can be used for administrative operations out of the entire grant. If my grant is not big, what will I do with 5 percent? How will we get good people to run the organisation? First five-eight years is all passion. I also gave up my banking job. But funds are needed to build capacity," she said.

"For the first time, we got a capacity building grant from Rainmatter (a venture firm) by Zerodha which is unheard of in sports. There is a need for good people to manage sports administration in the country. It's very interesting how different models are coming up because of Corporate India."

Bopaiah added that the capacity building branch is very common in education and other fields but not in sports. "Someone like Zerodha's Nithin Kamath, understands what it means to have good people driving a company. They too were a bootstrapped company."

Individual investors

While startups are limited, there are individual entrepreneurs who relate to the world of sports in personal capacities. "We have seen a lot of funding from entrepreneurs in their individual capacity like Rs 10-20 lakh grant," she said.

Bopaiah recalled how GoSports got their first grant from Sudha Murty many years back. "Wonderla's Arun Chittilappilly has been one of our donors. BI Worldwide's Siddharth Reddy started in his personal capacity and after many years their firm's CSR funding is coming to us. Machani Group, RMZ Corp, Brigade Group - all have funded us in their personal capacities."

Looking back at Brigade Group's funds for women's cricket, Bopaiah said that their women's cricket programme led to three girls qualifying for Women's Premier League (WPL). "CSR has created livelihood for sportspersons."

Listing and partnerships

The CEO is weighing an entry into the Social Stock Exchange, a platform on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) and Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) where social enterprises and non-profit organisations can list themselves to raise funds from the public.

From Aditya Birla, one of the first CSR partners, GoSports over the years got on board the likes of Sony Pictures, Dream 11, HDFC Bank and Infosys. "There are about 35-40 partners and can go up to 100 partners by Los Angeles (Olympics) 2028. RCB (Royal Challengers Bengaluru), the IPL team, is now working with us to fund athletes from the Siddi Tribe," Bopaiah said.

GoSports is in talks with more corporates. "Many companies are enquiring. Hyundai recently launched a disability programme led by their Korea headquarters. They want to change the way disability is viewed in India and one of the verticals is sports. We did a campaign launch with Shah Rukh Khan."

Athlete additions

She also expects to double the number of athletes GoSports backed during the Paris Olympics and Paralympics. "We had about 16 athletes in the Paralympics and 13 for the Olympics in Paris and we should be able to double it. India too from 117 should at least become a 200-athlete contingent."

She also expects more para athletes to participate in the Olympics. "We will see more para athletes because sports gives them an identity. But there is a system for people to get into para athletics. They need a disability certificate. Based on the disability, the athlete needs to be put into categories for competition and that classification is done by the international Paralympic committee. Indians have to go outside which costs Rs 3-4 lakh. We are trying to change that process. Around 1,000 athletes had gone through that process during Paris but if we want more participation like around 500 then we need 5,000 classifications for a 10 percent participation."

Bopaiah also pointed out how the US Olympic team had around 50 percent first-time Olympians out of their total 592 athletes participating in the Games.

According to their research, Bopaiah noticed that in India a lot of athletes drop out of a sport in the age group of 16-18, after they reach a national level. That's when sports organisations come into the picture to see if talent could meet opportunity.

A GoSports application takes 100 days. "Athletes apply, we review, speak to their coaches, see global benchmarks. In our last round, we shortlist 40-50 athletes. Then we see if athletes can win (competitions) with or without us in our last interaction round. For example, more than six of our athletes qualified for Tokyo while we were working with them for Paris because they were so good."

Bopaiah, who is ready to support more players, reiterated, "If Corporate India did not recognise us as a valuable and credible partner, this growth wouldn't have happened," she said.