Abodh Sharma
Jammu, Feb 17: Chief Minister Omar Abdullah is likely to chair yet another meeting of the Jammu and Kashmir State Sports Council scheduled for Tuesday, February 19, but some fifty similar meetings later, the State Sports Council has been reduced to a mere funding agency by the berserk sports associations, which have blatantly flouted its norms and directions without inviting any punitive action.
These sports associations expect the sports council to release funds on demand in their favour, but give a damn to the documented rules and regulations, sighting their autonomous character and affiliations with national sports federations. While the Union Ministry of Sports and Youth Affairs has tightened the noose around national sports federations, refusing them funds and permission to hold camps and send teams to international competitions unless they adhered to their guidelines, lack of political will has allowed sports associations in the state to operate according to their whims and fancies.
In a recent press conference, the Minister for sports and youth affairs affirmed his resolve to get the guidelines of the Council implemented in letter and spirit, but the office bearers of the associations have continued to cling on the posts for decades despite clear directive of the Council that no office bearer can hold office for more than two terms or eight years and beyond seventy years of age. It is shocking that the president of the Jammu and Kashmir Olympic association Rangil Singh and its Secretary General Ashutosh Sharma have held on these posts for countless terms and both are well above seventy.
Interestingly, during the last elections of the JKOA, held on April 6, 2011, the Sports council nominated its chief sports officer M S Baba as the observer. Through letter no. SC/844/03 dated April 4, 2011, issued to him by the administrative officer of the council, he was advised to ensure that the elections were conducted in line with the Council guidelines. He was specifically directed in the letter to ensure that "as per the directions of the sports council taken in its 45th meeting and communicated to all sports associations vide letter no. SC/76/-A/5087-6020 dated 18-11-1997, No office bearer shall hold office for more than two terms or eight years". Baba, the observer however turned a blind eye to the direction and defeated the very purpose of his appointment as observer when he ratified the elections of Rangeel Singh and Ashutosh Sharma as President and General Secretary of the JKOA for the umpteenth time.
Baba when contacted could not reason out why he did not hold the elections null and void when they were being held in violation of Council norms, he disclosed that action was being contemplated against all such associations which refuse to adhere to the laid norms.
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