No FIH recognition for IHF

M.S. Unnikrishnan

The International Hockey Federation (FIH) has reiterated that it recognises only Hockey India as the sole custodian of the game in India, and not the Indian Hockey Federation (IHF).

“The FIH continues to recognise its member, Hockey India, as the sole and exclusive national governing body for the sport of men’s and women’s hockey in India,” FIH president Leandro Negro wrote to the IHF in response to its letter, dated February 28, 2011.

“Nothing you say in your letter requires it or persuades it to change that position. Instead, the IHF is hereby required to stop claiming (in its letter head or otherwise) that it is affiliated to the FIH because that is not true. In the event it fails to do so, all of the FIH’s rights are reserved,” wrote Negre in his reply to the IHF’s letter.

He pointed out that the IHF had not been a member of, or otherwise affiliated to, the FIH since 2001, though the IHF claims in its letterhead that it is ‘affiliated to International Hockey Federation’. Negre said the FIH Statutes had been amended with effect from 2000 to require each member national association to be the sole governing body for both men’s and women’s hockey in its territory.

“The IHF did not meet that requirement — women’s hockey in India was run by a separate body, IWHF (Indian Women’s Hockey Federation) — and so the IHF ceased to be a member of the FIH,” Negre noted. He added that the FIH instead recognised the Indian Hockey Confederation (IHC), which was said to unify the IHF and the IWHF.

However, in 2008, the FIH was “compelled to derecognise the IHC” when it was revealed that the IHC did not, in fact, operate as the governing body of either men’s or women’s hockey in India, but instead those functions continued to be carried out by the IHF and the IWHF respectively, contrary to the FIH Statutes.