WFI secretary general Prem Chand Lochab asks for junior nationals to postpone, says announcement against WFI constitution

Newly elected Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) secretary general Prem Chand Lochab has asked to postpone the junior nationals, mentioning that the rules weren't followed for the announcement of the schedule.

Just hours after the WFI elections results were revealed, 13 out of the 15 members from president Sanjay Singh's faction attended a general meeting. The decision was made to cancel all the decisions taken by the ad-hoc committee under Bhupender Singh Bajwa.

The senior nationals, which was originally scheduled to take from January 2 to 5 next year in Jaipur, was postponed, and instead, the junior nationals dates were announced from December 28 to 30 this year in Gonda, Uttar Pradesh.

Lochab, one of the two members to get elected from the opposition camp of Anita Sheoran, claimed that the WFI Constitution mandates the secretary general to be part of the decision-making. He also said that some of the state federations were not in favor of junior nationals on short notice.

"In view of the above, it is felt that the grievances of state federations are genuine and may be considered and the U20 and U15 National Wrestling Championships 2023 scheduled at Nandini Nagar, Gonda from December 28-30 may be postponed," Lochab's letter to Singh read, as reported by news agency PTI.

"Decisions with regard to the conduct of sports tournaments and all communications pertaining to functions of WFI should be taken in accordance with the Constitution/By-laws of WFI and should be done through Secretary General as mandated in Constitution of WFI," the letter further read.

There were different reports on the attendance of the two members of the opposition faction. A report from PTI claimed that both members didn't attend the meeting while a report from The New Indian Express quoted one of the two members saying they went a bit late in the meeting.

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WFI president Sanjay Singh responds to Lochab's claims

WFI president Sanjay Singh said it was the need of the hour for the federation to conduct the junior nationals by the end of this year else many of them would be ineligible to participate in the U15 and U20 categories with age passing by.

"The decision was not taken to hurt anyone's ego. Our only concern was that junior wrestlers who could not play Nationals in 2023 calender should get the opportunity. A lot of wrestlers have their last year in U15 and U20 age groups and after January 1, 2024 they will lose eligibility to compete in Juniors," Singh told news agency PTI.

"Also there is no relocation or rescheduling of the junior Nationals. This is a fresh announcement. The ad-hoc panel had never scheduled the junior Nationals and the panel had only announced the senior Nationals and we have already cancelled all the taken by the ad-hoc body," he added.

The first general body meeting of the newly formed WFI will be staged in the second week of January as suggested by a few reports.