‘We won’t leave from Jantar Mantar until…’: Top wrestlers resume protest seeking WFI chief’s arrest
NEW DELHI,APR 23: The top Indian wrestlers are back at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar demanding the arrest of Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) chief Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh.
Ace India wrestler Sakshi Malik broke down while interacting with the media as wrestlers protest at Jantar Mantar.
Malik, as reported by ANI, said that seven women wrestlers, including a minor, had lodged a complaint with Connaught Place police station two days ago. But the police failed to register an FIR.
“We want the investigation to happen fast…We are being framed as liars which we cannot bear. We are waiting for two and a half months now but no one is listening. People are saying we are spent force that is why we are protesting. We just won a medal at CWG 2022,” Sakshi Malik told ANI at Jantar Mantar.
Meanwhile, Commonwealth Games (CWG) gold medallist Vinesh Phogat, who is part of the protests, said that the wrestlers haven’t got any response from the Sports Ministry or the oversight committee relating to the complaints made by them against Brij Bhushan.
“We are going to sleep and eat here till we get justice. We have been trying to contact them (Sports Minister Anurag Thakur and other relevant authorities) for three months. The members of the committee are not responding to us, sports ministry has also not said anything, they don’t even pick up our calls. We have won medals for the country and have put our careers at stake for this,” NDTV quoted Phogat as saying.
“We won’t leave from here until Brij Bhushan is arrested,” Bajrang Punia, a top wrestler, told NDTV.
Meanwhile, the Delhi Commission for Women has written to the Delhi Commissioner of Police demanding an FIR to be filed against Brij Bhushan Singh.
Early this month, The New Indian Express quoting multiple world medallists had alleged that attempts are being made to give a clean chit to the embattled WFI chief and prove the women wrestlers, who made accusations against him, wrong.
Bajrang Punia said on Sunday that the reason why wrestlers are protesting once again is that nothing has been done so far to resolve their issues and that the wrestlers are here to save wrestling.
Top Indian wrestlers, including Bajrang Punia, Vinesh Phogat, Ravi Dahiya, and Sakshi Malik, held a sit-in protest in Jantar Mantar in January this year, demanding that Brij Bhushan be removed from the head office and Wrestling Federation of India be disbanded. They had accused the body and its chief of sexual harassment and mistreatment of wrestlers.
Following the protest, in January, the Union Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports announced the formation of an ‘oversight committee’ to probe allegations levelled against the Wrestling Federation of India and its chief Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh and other coaches. The committee was given the task of submitting a report on the issue to the ministry.
Olympic medalist Mary Kom is heading the Oversight Committee. Former wrestler Yogeshwar Dutt, former shuttler Trupti Murgunde, SAI member Radhica Sreeman, ex-CEO of the Target Olympic Podium Plan Rajesh Rajagopalan, and CWG gold medalist Babita Phogat are the other members of the Mary Kom-led committee.
Vinesh Phogat, other top wrestlers protest, accuse WFI chief of sexual harassment
Earlier in April, Punia said that the wrestlers would go to court to protest against the report of the oversight committee appointed to investigate the matter.
“A news report recently claimed that one of the members of the oversight committee, which was constituted by the sports ministry to probe the allegations, was not in agreement with its final report. It indicates something suspicious is being done either by the committee or the ministry. Someone is doing something wrong,” the 2020 Tokyo Olympic bronze medallist told this daily.
Punia asked how could one trust the report if a committee member was not involved in the report submission and disagreed with the report. We were not even informed that the report was submitted to the ministry,” he added.
Punia also told TNIE that WFI should make public the statements given by female wrestlers in a sting operation to a private TV channel if it feels it is innocent and also, people would get to decide who is right or wrong.
The wrestler said that they (wrestlers) will start protesting once again and will even go to the high court as soon as possible. “We have to carry on with our sport, but we will protest and go to the high court as soon as possible,” said Punia.
-PTI
