On Friday, August 16, the Delhi High Court directed the restoration of the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) ad-hoc committee to oversee and supervise the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) operations. The decision of the court came after hearing the application by wrestlers, Bajrang Punia, Sakshi Malik, Vinesh Phogat, and Satyawart Kadian, who had sought suspension of the WFI.
Notably, these wrestlers had led protests last year against Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, the Chief of WFI at the time, for alleged sexual harassment of the seven women’s players. Shortly after the WFI held its elections to determine the next set of office bearers in December 2023, appointing Sanjay Singh, a supporter of Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, the Indian Sports Ministry suspended the organisation, on the basis of non-compliance of its own constitutional provisions.
It led to the IOA being tasked to run the WFI through its ad-hoc committee. The United World Wrestling (UWW) lifted their suspension imposed on WFI in February 2024, and a month later, the IOA dissolved its ad-hoc committee for operating WFI on a day-to-day basis.
IOA ah-hoc committee gets restored to run WFI: Delhi High Court
Earlier today, on the petition of the Indian wrestlers, the bench of justice Sachin Dutta pronounced the verdict on the case, and said, “I’ve directed for restoration of the ad hoc committee by the IOA. It will be open to the IOA to reconstitute the committee. Moreover, the Indian wrestling contingent were able to compete under India’s national flag at the Paris Olympics 2024 after UWW had revoked the suspension of WFI earlier this year.
Aman Sehrawat won the bronze medal for India in the men’s 57kg freestyle category in wrestling after defeating Darian Cruz of Puerto Rico 13-5.