Ministry asks National Sports Federations for NSDC compliance details
CHENNAI: The sports ministry has asked 57 National Sports Federations (NSF) to give detailed information regarding compliance to provisions in the National Sports Development Code (NSDC) by August 11.
As reported by The New Indian Express, this was in response to Delhi High Court’s directive to file a detailed affidavit on whether they are adhering to the code.
Through a letter signed by deputy secretary SPS Tomar, the ministry has asked the federations to send compliance/status to the objections raised by petitioner and sports lawyer Rahul Mehra. The letter says “the Ministry is required to file an affidavit with respect to compliance of sports code provisions by the 57 NSFs in response to the affidavit filed by Mr. Rahul Mehra wherein he has critically pointed that NSFs are not compliant with the provisions of the Sports Code”.
The ministry has also sent two forms to the NSFs to fill and explain whether they are following or are in violation of the code under 25 heads. Each form is related to Mehra’s counter-affidavit submitted to the court during Friday’s hearing.
According to ministry letter, the NSFs "are also requested to furnish comments/information in respect of compliance/status on the issues raised in Column No. 1 in Annexure K and Annexure L, respectively, of the reply, inter alia, quoting the relevant provision of the Constitution along with clause number and page number of Constitution and any other such relevant documents”.
As reported by this daily, Mehra had said he requested the court to ask the ministry to file a point-wise reply to his counter affidavit on whether NSFs adhere to the code. As one federation pointed out, most of the federations are following the main codes of age and tenure but issues like representation of women, requirement of defunct state Olympic associations’ approval, proxy voting, etc could be problematic. In certain cases, restrictions on civil servants being part of the executive council, tenure restrictions for only office-bearers could be sticky points.
The de-recognition of NSFs has forced Sports Authority of India to take care of some of the national camps as federations are not eligible to utilise facilities and government funding. As one federation official pointed out, the issue has been dragged a bit too long. If it is not settled early, there might be problems in sending teams to international competitions.