Shah Rukh Khan tweets against hockey

MUMBAI: Hockey players are not alone in their fight against the establishment. They have in their corner Shah Rukh Khan, who played the role of hockey coach Kabir Khan in the 2007 Bollywood blockbuster ‘Chak De! India’.

Khan, who also played hockey in his college days, expressed solidarity with the players and anguish at the current state of the game in the country on his Twitter page on Saturday.

“(I) feel awful for the Indian hockey team. To play for the country… (the) national sport and have to ask for salary. And we complain we don’t win gold,” the superstar, who co-owns IPL team Kolkata Knight Riders, wrote.

Another actor, Gul Panag, also rued the sad plight of hockey players. “Sad that our hockey team has to constantly fight for its dues — and not just financial. Whereas cricket…” – she didn’t have to spell it out.

Meanwhile, what started with a bang in Pune ended with a whimper in the Capital on Saturday. Indian hockey’s ‘watershed meeting’ petered out into a session where both Hockey India and the rebel players discussed the money aspect but resolved to concentrate on the game instead.

It’s apparent that HI, like KPS Gill-led Indian Hockey Federation (IHF) in the past, has managed to gag the players for the time being. The players will resume practice at the Balewadi complex on Sunday.

Both HI officials and the players were cagey after the marathon meeting which went on for close to three hours. HI president AK Mattoo said the players had listed out the problems to him which he has promised to look into.

One major complaint was about the diet at the Pune camp, which again the HI promised to look into. Skipper Rajpal Singh too said the problems had been sorted out.

“We have no problem now. It was a good meeting. We will not disclose the discussions we had on money matters. This is between us players and HI,” he said. Besides the diet, the players also wanted a group insurance policy in place.

But behind all the ostensible camaraderie lay the truth that the players were told, in curt terms, that they had committed the cardinal sin of going to the media with their problems.

“The players and coaches are bound by a code of conduct which says they have been barred from going to the media. This was pointed out to them. They did admit that they had done the wrong thing,” a source told TOI.

HI also did some tough talking, saying the players were faced with two choices – playing for India and not playing for India. “We knew they were misguided by a group. And when we talked straight they realised that what they were doing was not right,” said an official.

This was obvious in the uncommunicative ways of the players and HI after the meeting. What the players were also told is that that the present body in charge of HI would only consider their requests and recommend implementation to the democratically elected body which may take charge in the coming weeks. “This body is only a caretaker in nature.”

What also became evident after the meeting was the players’ sudden animosity towards the media. “Some of our statements were twisted in the media which created a lot of confusion,” was Rajpal’s strange comment.

The meeting was attended by Mattoo, Jagbir Singh, Anupam Ghulati, players Rajpal Singh, Sandeep Singh, Arjun Halappa, Tushar Khandker, Prabhjot Singh, Sardar Singh and coach Harendra Singh. The players were ‘suitably convinced’ on the money front, officials insisted.

“There is no such thing as dues. They were seeking monetary rewards and we told them that we would make suitable recommendations to the new body which takes over. We also convinced them in the meeting that we had no power or money to pay them. We are already in debt, having borrowd Rs 1 crore from a bank besides taking a loan of Rs 50 lakh from the Indian Olympic Association.”