University drops 2 outstation players

Dipti Sonawala

Following pressure from senior players of the Mumbai University’s hockey team and the Bharatiya Vidyarthi Sena (BVS), authorities were forced to drop two outstation players from the all-India inter-university hockey tournament on Thursday. Four students from Haryana and one from Rajasthan had been selected to the university squad, following which the BVS had raised the issue of local students losing positions to outsiders.

On Thursday, Amit Kumar and Pradip Kumar from Haryana were dropped from the team at the last minute. The Mumbai University team went on to win the first match against Aurangabad University by 20-0 at the Mumbai Hockey Association (MHA) ground in Churchgate.

However, the players who were dropped were upset that political pressure led to their ouster and not the lack of merit or talent. Amit (21) said: “What can we say now? We had come here as we thought we will get a chance to show our talent. But we could not even get a place in the 18-member team.” “I am not the part of the team so that leaves me with nothing to comment on,” was all Pradip said.

However, team captain Yuvraj Valmiki (21) maintained outstation players come here only with the motive of getting employment opportunities. He said, “Everyone knows that more often than not the host team wins. These players very well knew that if Mumbai is hosting this year’s all India inter-university tournament then the chances of our university wining the tournament are high and the players of the winning team can easily get government jobs. It’s good that we protested and got the two players dropped from the team, they were not good enough as compared to two of our local players.” The five students had taken admissions at the Guru Nanak Khalsa College in Matunga.

The last-minute change saddened the other three outstation players Pramod Kumar and Dharmedra Singh Antil from Haryana and Ratinder Singh from Rajasthan, who, however, made it to the final team. Antil (21) said, “We are not here to grab any opportunity but to play the game. Whatever happened was not right, but at this point of time there is no use of talking about it. We better concentrate on the game.”

The BVS, which till Wednesday was fighting for the selection of local players in the team, is happy with the new composition though it still includes three outstation players. BVS university senate member Pradeep Sawant said, “The captain and other players are satisfied with the new team. The three players left are good and so they were not dropped.”