HI, IHF officials meet Maken to resolve hockey crisis

NEW DELHI: Hockey India (HI) and Indian Hockey Federation (IHF) officials met sports minister Ajay Maken on Thursday to resolve their long-standing dispute over recognition and power-sharing.

Thanks to the meeting, they made considerable progress towards having one unified body in the country.

The two warring factions met in the morning and had a second round of talks in the evening during which it was decided to have a new name of the merged body.

Names such as Bharat Hockey, Indian Hockey and Indian Hockey Confederation cropped up during the meeting, attended by secretaries of both the HI and IHF.

From Hockey India, apart from Batra, Rajeev Mehta, Pratap Satpathy and Anandeshwar Pandey were present at the meeting. IHF was represented by secretary Ashok Mathur.

“We had a positive meeting. Our stand is clear, we have agreed in principle to all the recommendations by the sports ministry. Tomorrow, there is another round of meeting and we are looking forward to have an amicable solution to the issue,” HI secretary-general Narinder Batra said.

IHF secretary Ashok Mathur said he was satisfied with the outcome of the meeting.

“We had a joint meeting with Hockey India and sports ministry officials today. The ministry has given us a blueprint of the merger. They have suggested an expanded executive board of the proposed body. They have also asked us to look for an alternative name of the merged body which should be neither HI nor IHF,” said Mathur.

“Tomorrow we will be discussing the procedure of merger in details. Today’s meeting was a positive one and we are looking forward to an amicable solution to the issue.”

Hockey has been mired in controversies over the past few years, as there has been a bitter war going on between HI and the de-recognised IHF over the management of sportspersons.