The Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) elections got further delayed after the Gauhati High Court extended the date of hearing in a petition filed by the Assam Wrestling Association (AWA). The elections were supposed to be conducted on July 11 but were stayed by the court after the AWA filed a petition. The next date for the hearing set by the court is July 28.
AWA had filed a plea seeking rights to participate in the election process. The Assam association had claimed that the state body was entitled to be part of the affiliated members of WFI but was not given recognition by the national body even after the Executive Committee recommended the same in 2014.
AWA advocate opens on Court's order of next hearing
The AWA advocate Devajit Saikia has opened up about the Court's order of extending the hearing date. "The WFI lawyer (ad-hoc committee) didn't appear before the court today. Representatives of the sports ministry, which is among the respondents, sought one week's time to file their affidavit. Accordingly, the court asked them to file the affidavit by July 26 and listed the matter for July 28," Saikia said as quoted by PTI.
There is no clarity why the ad-hoc committee, which is one of the respondents with the Sports Ministry, did not send a lawyer. "It is the job of the ad-hoc panel to respond to the petition. We did not have a role in that. Our body is suspended, how we could interfere in this? We had made our position clear to the Returning Officer that Assam was never a full member, it had an associate membership without voting right," said an official from the previous WFI set-up.
The Gauhati High Court had earlier stayed the elections of the federation on June 25, which was the final day to submit names for the electoral college. It was contended by the petitioner that unless it gets affiliated with the WFI body, the election process should be stalled.
The WFI had set May 7 as the election date before being suspended by the Sports Ministry. Anurag Thakur had stated that the elections will be held on June 30 after he met the protesting wrestlers. The Indian Olympic Association kept July 4 as the date of the elections before the Returning Officer set July 6 for the same. The date was further pushed to July 11 after five disaffiliated state bodies staked claim to be eligible for voting.
