Mukesh walks out after being denied chief coach’s post

BANGALORE: Controversies continued to haunt Indian hockey with three-time Olympian Mukesh Kumar walking out of the national camp in Sports Authority of India a few hours after his arrival in protest against being denied the post of chief coach for the junior team.

Mukesh, 41, who landed in Bangalore in the morning, was shocked when Hockey India and SAI conveyed to him that he would have to work under Harendra Singh, who was removed from the post of national coach after the Azlan Shah Cup in May.

It was sad that a veteran Olympian and Padma Shri award winner being treated this way. All along, Mukesh was led to believe that he would be the chief coach of the team. He had agreed to be part of the Indian set-up after making it clear that he would either assist a foreign coach or assume complete charge of the junior sector.

According to AB Subbaiah, a member of HI’s coaching committee, Mukesh was chosen as chief coach during a February meeting headed by the panel chief Pargat Singh.

The trials in Jalandhar this month too saw Mukesh pick the 48 probables with the selectors and sign on the dotted line as chief coach. However, in his conversation on Thursday with HI secretary general Narinder Batra, Mukesh was categorically told that at no point of time had he been offered the post.