BEYOND THE PLAYING FIELD: ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, ATHLETE DATA AND PRIVACY IN INDIAN SPORTS, RETHINKING OWNERSHIP, CONSENT AND COMMERCIALISATION
Abstract
Abstract
Artificial
intelligence has moved from the margins of Indian sport into its operational
core, depending on a single raw material: data generated by the bodies and
movements of individual athletes. Franchises, national federations, technology
vendors and broadcasters now routinely collect biometric, locational,
physiological and performance data that Indian sports law has not kept pace
with. There is no dedicated statute, regulation or sport-specific code that
answers three foundational questions: who owns an athlete's performance and
biometric data; on what lawful basis is that data collected, used and shared;
and how the resulting commercial value should be distributed. Indian sport
currently governs athlete data through a patchwork of general instruments the
constitutional right to privacy, the Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023,
ordinary contract law, and the National Sports Governance Act 2025 none of
which was designed with the peculiarities of the athlete-employer-federation
relationship in mind. This article argues that this patchwork is inadequate and
produces a structural imbalance in which athletes generate the data, technology
vendors and franchises capture its economic value, and privacy protection is
left to standard-form consent that athletes are rarely in a position to refuse.
The article examines the extent of AI-driven data collection in Indian sport,
the constitutional and statutory privacy framework, the silence of the National
Sports Governance Act 2025 on data governance, the contested question of data
ownership, the illusion of consent in hierarchical sporting relationships, and
the commercialisation of athlete data. It concludes with proposals for a
sport-specific data governance framework, including a graded category for
biometric and health data, mandatory athlete data policies for federations,
statutory collective bargaining over data clauses, and revenue-sharing formulas
for the commercial licensing of identifiable athlete data.
Published Paper
Author Details
Article Information
BEYOND THE PLAYING FIELD: ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE, ATHLETE DATA AND PRIVACY IN INDIAN SPORTS, RETHINKING OWNERSHIP, CONSENT AND COMMERCIALISATION
Authors: SHARAD PRATAP SINGH, SOUMIL
- Journal IJLRA
- ISSN 2582-6433
- Volume 3
- Issue 6
About Journal
International Journal for Legal Research and Analysis
- AbbreviationIJLRA
- ISSN2582-6433
- AccessOpen Access
- LicenseCC 4.0
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