CHENNAI: The Delhi High Court has stayed the operations of a new committee that was formed by the sports ministry to ‘review the Draft National Code for Good Governance in Sports, 2017’. The 13-member panel, that was formed only last month to give their suggestions ‘for making it acceptable to all the stakeholders so that there is a sync between government and all stakeholders and a balance is struck between autonomy of NSFs vis-a-vis need for transparency and accountability’ exist only in name as of today.
Sports lawyer Rahul Mehra, who had challenged the order in the High Court, said his arguments was based around how the committee was formed to dilute the Draft Code. “I had told the court about how the committee was going to dilute the norms around age, tenure, identity of office-bearers, voting rights of state olympic associations and so on. The court agreed with my assessment and stayed the new panel.” He said as of now the committee doesn’t exist.
According to Mehra, the High Court, in its order, also asked sports secretary, RS Julaniya, to file an affidavit before December 20 vis-a-vis status of the revised sports governance code of 2017. However, Julaniya said he hasn’t seen the order yet. “It is not possible to comment on something that I haven’t seen yet. Let me see the order first before giving an opinion.”
The revised Code, in its undiluted form, would have an immediate impact on the governance of NSFs — the most important being the rules on age and tenure. It wants the 70-year age cap to apply to all members and not just apply to office bearers as is the status quo. Mehra is of the opinion that the ‘committee will straight away dilute these curbs’ to ensure that the current way of running federations continue. Mehra wanted the age and tenure rule to continue and modification in any form might lead to dilution. He also doesn’t want politicians to be allowed in sports administration. Also state associations’ voting rights must be reviewed.
Mehra said that the court felt the ministry had six months to evaluate and discuss so it’s prudent that it should be in implementation stage. It needs to be seen what approach the ministry takes. They have until December 20 to file an affidavit.
When the 2017 draft sports code was presented in October, the Indian Olympic Association was against certain provisions. It decided to oppose the entire draft sports code when the sports minister intervened. On October 11, on the sidelines of a meeting between the sports ministry and national sports federations and the IOA, the minister announced that a committee will be formed to discuss with all stakeholders pros and cons of the draft.
The ministry also sought suggestions from the IOA and the NSFs by November 10. They, among others, suggested that age and tenure; political patronage and restoring voting rights of state Olympic associations. Another issue the IOA wanted reversed was that all restrictions should be limited to three office bearers (president, secretary and treasurer) instead of all members. The ministry, however, believes that the code should be for development and good governance of sports in the country.