Rupinder SinghNew Delhi, Jan. 5 -- Sport, at its best, has long served as a quiet but powerful bridge between nations, an arena where rivalry co-exists without enmity. To turn it into an extension of political grievance is to misunderstand both its history and its value.
For decades, governments and sporting bodies alike recognised that athletic competition could ease political tensions rather than deepen them.
The most famous example remains the so-called ping-pong diplomacy of the early 1970s, when a simple table tennis exchange helped thaw relations between the United States and China after decades of estrangement.
Sport did not resolve ideological differences, but it created a channel where none had existed.
There have also been mom...