Athletes to get double daily allowance

Sabi Hussain

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, July 19

The Indian Olympics Association (IOA) would be offering a daily pocket allowance of $50 each to the Indian athletes in Rio. The 120 athletes, including 54 women, will get an additional $50 from the Sports Ministry during their stay at the Games Village.

The amount of $100 per athlete/per day is by far the highest offered by the government for the Summer Games. At the 2012 London Games, the athletes received $50 as daily allowance from the Ministry. But this time IOA has chipped in with additional grant. “This is for the first time that the IOA will be offering $50 to each athlete as the daily allowance,” confirmed Rakesh Gupta, IOA joint secretary and India’s chef-de-mission for Rio Games.

The Ministry has already been paying an “out-of-pocket” allowance of Rs 1 lakh per month to each athlete who has qualified for Rio, for training. 

For the training-cum-competition programme abroad, an athlete gets $100 per day. The athletes are getting funds from the Target Olympic Podium Scheme and National Sports Development Fund separately.

Indian food at Games Village

In another good news for the athletes, they will be served Indian food at the Games Village. The Organising Committee has accepted the request of the IOA to have a variety of Indian dishes. This was after some of the athletes had requested the Ministry for Indian food at the Games Village.

The food will include broccoli, eggplant, mix vegetables, chana masala, matar paneer and dal makhani, among other vegetarian and non-vegetarian food.