CHENNAI: Bangladesh joined India in making a late bid to get shooting included into the Commonwealth Games programme for the Birmingham edition. Md Zahid Ahsan Russel, the country’s Sports Minister, in a letter to UK minister of state for the Commonwealth, the United Nations and South Asia, Tariq Ahmad, requested the latter to intervene and reverse the decision made by the 2022 Games Organising Committee.
“You may be aware that football, cricket, archery and shooting are our potential games right now,” Russel stated in the letter. “In this context, I am writing to you with regard to shooting and its proposed exclusion from the Commonwealth Games 2022, scheduled to be held in Birmingham. It would be deeply appreciated if you kindly extend your personal intervention so that shooting may be included (...).”
Zahid also pointed out that excluding a sport’s athletes went against the grain of the Games’ official slogan — ‘The Games for everyone.’ He also said Bangladesh couldn’t push a case for shooting as they had no members in the Commonwealth Games Executive Council and in the Functioning Committees of the Commonwealth Games. Kiren Rijiju, India’s Sports Minister, had written a similar letter to Nicky Morgan, his UK counterpart last month.
There is going to be a high-level meeting between Commonwealth Games Federation’s key members and the Indian Olympic Association sometime in October.