CHENNAI: The question of whether the Gymnastics Federation of India (GFI) will get recognition from the Sports Ministry will be decided by the end of the month, if a top IOA official is to be believed. “The dispute committee headed by Rakesh Sharma will take a decision by this month after going through the responses of the 12 state units,” the official said.
The long-standing tussle between IOA and GFI looked like continuing before IOA president Narinder Batra wrote a letter to the president and secretary of the de-recognised GFI, Sudhakar Shetty and Shantikumar Singh, last month stating that the de-recognition severely impacts the representation of athletes in international events.
International Gymnastics Federation (IGF) council member, Kaushik Bidiwala, who was in the city for the trials for the first Aerobic Gymnastics Asian Cup to be held in Mongolia, too was optimistic. “GFI has done everything on their part. I hope there is a decision soon,” Bidiwala, also the GFI vice-president, said.
While the selection process for the Asian Games was conducted under the watchful eyes of an IOA-approved panel, there is no need for any such formalities for selecting a team for the Asian Cup to be held from September 14 to 16.
“The CWG and the Asian Games come under their banner. But there are plenty of other tournaments organised by IGF. The GFI has the rights to conduct selection trials for such events,” Bidiwala added. Interestingly, the IOA official said they were not aware of any such trials.
vimalsankar@newindianexpress.com
Squad: Individual men: Harshil Patel (U-14), Abhijeet Dhere (U-14), Aniket Chakravarti (U-17), Bhushan Deshmukh (U-17), Joney Kumar, Dinesh Singh. Individual women: Ariha Pangambam (U-14), Sneha Irengbam (U-14), Thokchom Mayabatidey (U-17), Saharsha Chhabra (U-17), Tanvi Gamit. Trio: Harshil Patel (U-14), Vishwa Patel (U-14), Shubham Rana (U-14); Nishant Chauhan (U-17), Prakruti Shinde (U-17), Mahek Shah (U-17); Mayengbam Itchangcho, Jitu Singha, Joney Kumar. Group: Mayengbam Itchangcho, Jitu Singha, Joney Kumar, Shiva Kumar, Sadeepchand Ramola.