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In a major blunder, four Indians were found representing the neighbouring nation Nepal in the Tent Pegging World Cup qualification event last year in Greater Noida.
The event, which was held from March 16 to 18 and was organized by the Equestrian Federation of India (EFI), along with Equiwings Sports, under the aegis of the International Tent Pegging Federation (ITPF), whose headquarters are located in Muscat, Oman.
Now in a major development in the year old event, International Olympic Committee (IOA) president Narinder Batra has written to the Equestrian Federation of India (EFI) over Indians as Nepal Athletes in the world tent pegging qualifier. In his letter Batra has mentioned that since tent-pegging is not an Olympic event, a Federation can get away with such unethical acts as allowing Indians to compete as nationals of another country. "This is a very serious offense," he said.
"After reading a newspaper report, I wrote to you as the EFI Secretary-General seeking some clarifications. However, instead of responding to the points raised, your audacious reply implies that I should not be concerned about tent-pegging since it is not an Olympic discipline," Batra added.
Batra further mentioned that I therefore guess that you are unaware that many NSFs of non-Olympic disciplines also come under the IOA fold. Kabaddi, Kho Kho, Polo, Cycle Polo spring to mind readily. Worse, the actions of EFI has brought strong disrepute to the community of sports administrators in a matter of grave concern for everyone in the Indian sports ecosystem.
Since writing to you on February 7, 2022, I have tried to understand the circumstances and actions taken by EFI. I have found out from Facebook posts that you were yourself present and gave away the medals to the winning teams, including the 'Nepal' squad. It should have been easy for you to recognize that your own athletes were masquerading as Nepali riders.
I request you to kindly share a copy of the Report of the Enquiry Committee and the Minutes of the Emergent Meeting of the EFI Executive Council held on February 6, 2022, where that Report was discussed and the necessary action was being initiated 'as per law' to that I can understand the seriousness with which has dealt with the matter.
IOA chief has also talked about the revenue earned by them and said, "Besides, I have perused the audited statement of accounts of EFI and have been shocked to see that CFI has earned Rs 8,37,05,452.93 in five years from charging a fee for a No Objection Certificate (NOC) for Indian riders participation in overseas events by charging them a fee of USD 250 or Rs 19,086 (USD = 76.35 Rs) per each NOC. Instead of providing support to athletes, it would appear that EFI is making money by charging them to grant NOCs to them to compete in events overseas, which is condemnable and totally not acceptable. I look forward to an early reply so that IOU can make a fair and considered decision."
Earlier, reacting to the blunder, EFI secretary-general Col. Jaiveer Singh said that the officials didn't do a background check as the names were approved from the Nepalese federation.
"The Nepal federation okayed this. The Nepalese federation sent the names to us. The ITPF okayed Nepal's participation. That's why we thought that these players must be genuine. Once a national federation of a country says these are the players who are going to represent them, we go through with it. Nepalese citizens do not require visa to visit India. So our main focus was on Pakistan and USA. I was vigorously pursuing the visas of Pakistan and the American teams," Col. Jaiveer had said earlier.
