CHENNAI: For the first time in over 18 months, the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) is organizing a press conference on Thursday. The meet is titled as Powering India’s Sporting Aspirations: IOA’s Vision 2036.
What seems to be the most interesting part is that it is not called by the IOA president or the warring unit of the Executive Committee. It is called by the Executive Council of the IOA.
There have been indication over the last couple of months that the IOA is on its mending part. The majority of the Executive Committee members had revolted against IOA president PT Usha when Chief Executive Officer Raghuram Iyer was appointed last year in January.
More than 10 EC members had objected to the appointment over Iyer’s salary which amounted to Rs 20 lakh a month besides other remunerations. However, the functioning of the IOA did not stop. The National Games in Uttarakhand was conducted even though the event was not passed by the EC. What seemed even more intriguing is that the EC members suddenly fell silent and did not say anything when Usha conducted the Games quite successfully.
Iyer, whose salary was held back by the finance committee and the treasurer, continued to discharge his duties whenever necessary. He was part of the delegation that went to Lausanne to discuss India’s 2036 Olympic bid last month. He was there in England when India went to discuss the 2030 Commonwealth Games.
Mending the IOA would be the right move because of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) that had been insisting that India needed to have a strong organization to make a successful bid. It said that India must resolve its internal issues as early as possible or it might jeopardize the bid which the government is keen to make it successful.
Recently, two prominent EC members treasurer of IOA Sahdev Yadav, who was the most vocal of the lot, and Bhupinder Singh Bajwa were part of a committee to see into the election matter of the Boxing Federation of India (BFI). It needs to be seen when the finance committee release the salaries of two persons – the CEO and the IOA president’s Executive assistant.
The sports ministry too seemed to be keen on IOA finding an amicable solution.