Usha ignores IOA executive members for National Games

Indian Olympic Association president PT Usha has once again stamped her signature while deciding on the committees that will run the National Games. The delayed 38th National Games will be held in Uttarakhand from January 28 to February 14

In her letter to Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami confirming the dates, Usha has also signalled that she was willing to accommodate various national sports federations and state bodies. However, she has not included any of the IOA executive committee members, who have been opposing her.

She has appointed Sunaina Kumari as the head of the Games Technical Conduct Committee (GTCC). The committee is tasked to decide on the sports programme. Ravinder Choudhary, Cyrus Poncha, Maninderpal Singh, Bholanath Singh, Kamlesh Mehta, SP Deshwal, Prashant Kushwaha, Digvijay Singh and Harjinder Singh Jindi are the other members.

The new committee is a far cry from the GTCC appointed for the conduct of the Goa National Games, which was held last year. It was headed by IOA EC member Amitabh Sharma and also included the likes of Sahdev Yadav, Gagan Narang, Gen Harpal Singh (retd) and Rohit Rajpal.

Interestingly, the decision taken by Usha comes after a month of upheaval within the IOA. After Usha sent notices on various charges, including to the treasurer for financial mismanagement and to joint secretary Kalyan Chaubey for granting affiliation to the Taekwondo Federation of India, the opposing group had announced plans to bring a no confidence motion against Usha for being autocratic, while alleging financial loss to the IOA.

Usha has further ignored the EC members while appointing a coordination committee between the NSFs and state Olympics associations, a protocol committee and a safeguarding committee that has the likes of Neetal Narang and Suman Kaushik.

Interestingly, Sunaina is not part of the present EC as she did not contest the last IOA election that was held in December 2022.

‘Dates can change’

The IOA president in her letter to the Uttarakhand CM has further stated that dates for the National Games should not clash with the Asian Winter Games. “As you are aware the Asian Winter Games, organized by the Olympic Council of Asia are scheduled at Harbin, China during February 07 to February 14 2025. India will be fielding a very large contingent for these Games and therefore, there will be a need to suitably alter the dates of 38th National Games so that there is no conflict between these two major events,” Usha said.