One of India’s leading Sports Administrators, five-time National Decathlon Champion, senior sports achiever in National and International arena and the first person in Kodava community to secure a Doctoral degree in Sports, Dr. C.M. Muthaiah passed away in Bengaluru on Dec. 5. He was 87.

Dr. Codanda Madappa Muthaiah was born in Madikeri on April 30, 1932 and had secured gold medal (first rank) in M.Sc. Biomechanics from Germany. Despite his education in Science, he had deep interest in sports and Muthaiah was involved in Decathlon, Long Jump and High Jump and had achieved National and International-level recognitions.

From 1956 till 1960, Dr. Muthaiah had won National-level and Asian-level championships. He had won the National Championship crown five times and recognising his achievements, he was bestowed the title “Golden Shoe” in 1977. One of his biggest regret was his narrowly missing the Decathlon Medal in the Tokyo Asian Games in 1958. Dr. Muthaiah was instrumental in bringing the Sports Authority of India, South Centre, to Bengaluru.

After dedicating his youth to the cause of sports, Codanda Muthaiah served the field as a Coach and Sports Officer. He went on to become a Senior First Grade Coach at Netaji Subhas National Institute of Sports commonly known as National Institute of Sports (NIS), the Sports Training Centre at Patiala in 1962. He later served as the chief of NIS, an Academic Wing of Sports Authority of India and Asia’s largest Sports Institute in Patiala, Punjab.

Dr. Muthaiah had also served as the Director General of the Sports Department of the Union Government and in 1982, he was conferred the ‘Asiad Vishist Jyothi’ for his contribution to Asian Games and Rajyotsava Award in 2013.

He was appointed as the Technical Advisor when the Asian Games was organised in New Delhi in 1982 and had served as Technical Director to various other National and International Games.

He also served as the Secretary General of Asian Track and Field Research Centre. After retirement, he was residing at Jayamahal Extension in Bengaluru. He is survived by wife Parvathi and a daughter.