The Indian Olympic Association (IOA) has asked the Secretary General of the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) to hand over all official documents to its ad-hoc committee to ensure that the outgoing office-bearers have no role in the running of the federation. The WFI said it has no problem in complying with the orders of the IOA as it is already cooperating with the authorities. An IOA official, however, made it clear that the move should not be seen as dissolution of the federation.
The official told ‘PTI-Bhasha’, ‘After the elections, the administrative powers will go to the WFI. The newly elected officials will run the federation.” The IOA has appointed an ad-hoc committee to run the day-to-day affairs of the WFI and conduct the elections for the national federation. This ad hoc committee has been appointed on the orders of the Sports Ministry. The country’s top wrestlers have accused WFI chief Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh of sexually harassing women wrestlers and are staging a sit-in at Jantar Mantar demanding his arrest.
In a letter issued on Friday, the IOA said that all administrative, financial and regulatory roles of the WFI will now be performed by the ad-hoc committee. “With reference to the above (IOA order dated May 12, 2023), it is clarified that the ad-hoc committee appointed by the IOA for the governance of wrestling shall carry out all the functions and responsibilities of the National Sports Federation,” the letter said. It added, “Now that the ad-hoc committee is in existence, the outgoing office-bearers of WFI will have no role in any work related to this federation.”
It has been said that the outgoing office bearers should immediately hand over all the documents related to the federation to the ad hoc committee. WFI secretary general VN Prasud said they have no objection to sharing relevant documents with the IOA panel. Prasud said, “It is a common process. Even when the monitoring committee was constituted, we handed over all the necessary files to them. Now there is an ad-hoc committee and we will provide them whatever documents they need to run the WFI. He said, “It is not an issue. Our term has already ended and the IOA and the government are looking after it. It is normal process to ask for these documents.
