Here’s a short summary of the multi-billion-crore football World Cup amid many protests.
Sport is a passion that transcends religion, race and nationality. Football is the sport that can be played in the most countries in the world and has the most fans. As far as football is concerned players play for their countries only for series like World Cup, Copa America, Euro etc. At other times there are a thousand criticisms that it is played only for club teams, but the soccer World Cup is viewed as much as the expectation of the 100-meter race of the Olympic Games.
Especially since every football team plays as a way to express the culture and politics of their countries, the mouse for the football world cup is also high in European countries.
In 2010, Qatar was given the opportunity to host such a football world cup, which did not have even the minimum structure for such a football world cup at that time. At a time when countries like Australia, which have been playing in the World Cup series, demanded to host this World Cup, there were many protests that Qatar was given this opportunity.
It was said that the Qatari nationals got the opportunity to host the World Cup by paying several crores of rupees in bribes. How could a football world cup be allowed to be held in a country where human rights are being violated, Qatar can only host the world cup in November-December.
If this happens, the Champions League series run by UEFA and the football series in every European country will have to be changed, there were many protests. In fact, 16 of the 22 people who voted in favor of hosting the World Cup in Qatar resigned from their positions within three months of the vote.
The then FIFA president, who approved the hosting of the World Cup in Qatar after 17 years in office, resigned a few days after being elected for the 5th term, and is being investigated in several cases including money laundering in Switzerland. Likewise, in 2015, 6 FIFA executives were arrested and interrogated in cases including money laundering in the United States. Qatar will host the World Cup next week despite many such protests over the past 12 years.
We would have heard stories of a stadium being set up for the World Cup series. But can you believe that a city is built to host a World Cup series? Yes, in the last 10 years, Qataris have built a city to the surprise of all countries, including 7 football stadiums, a new airport, a new metro, a new highway, and new star hotels at an estimated cost of 220 billion dollars to host the World Cup in 2022.
South Africa spent 3.6 billion dollars for the 2010 World Cup, Brazil spent 15 billion dollars in 2014, and 11.5 billion dollars in 2018. Qatar has spent 220 billion dollars only for the 2022 World Cup series. With a total population of just 2.224 million people in Qatar, which earns income from natural gas, oil storage, pearl mining etc., more than 20 lakh people have been brought in as workers from Bangladesh, India and other countries in Asia to develop all these infrastructures in the last 12 years.
The government has not provided any of the workers who have come to their countries from abroad with the benefits they are legally entitled to. In fact, even though studies have come out that more than 6,500 people have died while working to improve the infrastructure of Qatar, Qatari people have said that only 37 people have died according to the laws of their country.
It is apart from the injustices done to women in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, and the LGBT community. The question of why the football world cup is being held in such a country when the community is denied access there continues to this day.
– Santana Kumar