Randhir re-elected OCA Gen Secretary

IOA president Vijay Kumar Malhotra hailed the re-election of Randhir Singh as the Secretary General of the Olympic Council of Asia.

“Randhir Singh’s re election for the record sixth term shows that OCA wants to make full use of his experience as sports administrator” Prof Malhotra said.

He said it is a matter of pride for India that Randhir is also the IOC member and vice president of the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) and “No foreigner has raised any objection about his continuing in these posts for more than two terms“.

It is important to note that Randhir Singh was re elected in absentia as he could not attend the General Assembly meeting of the OCA at Tokyo because of personal reasons, Prof Malhotra said adding “Yet all the 45 countries reposed the trust in him shows the high regards Indian sports administrators have in the International forum”.

Prof Malhotra said the International sports bodies are run by the people who have lot of experience but here in India “the sports ministry wants the National Sports Federation to be deprived of experienced administrators”.

“If our sports minister had his way, Randhir would not have got re elected to the OCA, mercifully that was not the case” he added.

Prof Malhotra urged the sports minister to give up his misguided efforts to control the Indian sports by forcing the tenure terms and age limits. “No where in the sports world this is applicable so why the minister here is so keen to apply the guidelines is not clear”.

“There is no tenure or age bar for MPs, MLAs or minister... There are also no guidelines for age or tenure in the hundreds of thousands registered societies or NGOs, why sports bodies or its officials are being targeted,” he said.

“The need of the hour is to improve the standard of sports. To fight the menace of doping and to prepare for the London Olympics, I urge the sports minister to focus on these areas rather than indulging in a witch hunt of sports administrators,” he added.

He asserted that IOA is willing to co operate with the sports ministry for the betterment of the sports in the country but the government also must ensure that Olympic charter is respected.