Lok Sabha to Debate Landmark Bills on Sports Governance and Ports
The Lok Sabha is scheduled to consider and pass three significant pieces of legislation. The National Sports Governance Bill, 2025, and the National Anti-Doping (Amendment) Bill, 2025, aim to reform sports administration, promote ethical practices, and align with global anti-doping standards. Additionally, the Indian Ports Bill, 2025, seeks to consolidate laws, promote integrated port development, and establish new regulatory bodies, promising wide-ranging impacts on India's sports and maritime sectors.
Unpacked:
According to policy experts, recurring issues include opaque finances, ad-hoc selections, weak athlete grievance systems, and lack of independent oversight of federations including the BCCI. The Governance Bill creates a National Sports Board with SEBI-like powers, mandates codes of ethics, transparent elections, and athlete-friendly grievance redressal, aiming to professionalize and standardize administration across 50+ National Sports Federations.
The Bill proposes bringing the BCCI under the National Sports Board’s regulatory ambit, requiring formal recognition and compliance with governance norms, ethics, RTI coverage, and tribunal-based dispute resolution. Disputes—including selections and elections—would go to a new National Sports Tribunal with civil-court powers, with appeals only to the Supreme Court.
All recognized sports bodies must implement a Safe Sport Policy protecting women and minors and maintain athlete-friendly, transparent, time-bound grievance mechanisms. A National Sports Tribunal with civil-court powers will adjudicate disputes (selection, eligibility, elections), offering specialized, quicker resolution, with appeals only to the Supreme Court.
While the summary highlights consolidation and integrated development, similar port reform efforts typically centralize standards, streamline clearances, and create regulators to improve capacity, safety, and competition. This can reduce logistics costs and support trade-led growth. Specific structures in the 2025 bill aren’t detailed in cited sources here; expect a central regulatory authority and harmonized rules across major and non-major ports based on recent reform patterns[—].