New Delhi, June 27 Indian Olympic Association (IOA) President Narinder Batra said that sports administration in the country will be facing dire problems if day-to-day dealings between India's Olympic governing body and the National Sports Federations (NSF) has to go through a court.
"The way I understand is that all funding for camps has been stopped because for everything permission has to come from the court," Batra told on Saturday. "Now if day-to-day permissions need to come from the court then there is a serious problem."
The Sports Ministry on Thursday revoked the provisional recognition that it had given to 54 National Sports Federations earlier in the month under the direction of the Delhi High Court. The court had said that the ministry by doing so has not complied with an order that was issued on February 7 this year which required the ministry and the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) to "inform the court in advance" while taking "any decision in relation to the NSFs."
"Right now we are fortunate that we don't really have any events lined up in the next 3-4 months. If an athlete commits to participate in an event and if the permission for this has to come from the court and that gets delayed, the athlete or team will face a ban of two years for committing and then not participating," said Batra.
The IOA President is also worried that this could lead to the suspension of its status as India's National Olympic Committee.
"This can even lead to de-recognition. If any NSF says to its International Federation that we are not able to do anything because IOA is not giving any permission. The IOA will then say that we have to take approval from the court as do the ministry then it could come to government interference in the autonomous working of sports bodies and we will get suspended.
"As citizens of India we have to follow and respect the orders of the court and we will do it. And if that means not winning any medal at the Olympics so be it, what can we do now," said Batra.
( With inputs from IANS )