KARACHI: Several Pakistan hockey Olympians on Wednesday expressed their annoyance and surprise at the absence of any representation of the national game in the newly formed newly formed Pakistan Sports Board set up and demanded that the composition on the board be reviewed at once.

In an amazing development this week which clearly defies logic, the government and the IPC Ministry completely overlooked any representation of the national game in the 11-member executive board of PSB constituted this week.

Prominent Olympians including Manzoor Jr, Rashid Jr, Hanif Khan, Khawaja Junaid, Kaleem­ullah, Nasir Ali, Wasim Feroze, Ahmad Alam, Rana Mujahid Ali, Danish Kaleem, Shafqat Malik, Anjum Saeed, Qamar Ibrahim, Kamran Ashraf, Secretary KHA Haider Hussain and other international the players on Wednesday expressed their anger and demanded of the government to immediately review the composition of the new board and appoint a hockey representative as per the rules and to address the sentiments of the millions of hockey fans in the country.

“It is totally incomprehensible not to include the representation of the national game of hockey in the board,” said Olympian Manzoor Jr who spoke to media on Wednesday along with former captains Olympian Hanif Khan and Olympian Rashid Jr among others. “It is a blunder and extremely disappointing that while athletics, football and others sports have representation in the newly-formed PSB set-up, the national game of hockey which has brought the highest number of laurels for the country has been ignored,” they said.

According to the notification, Chairman Higher Education Commission (HEC) has also been appointed as a member of Pakistan Sports Board.

The former Olympians called for an immediate resh­uffle of the board and also questioned the presence of an official of a Lahore-based pharmaceutical company on the board which they said did not have any merit whatsoever.

Published in Dawn, June 25th, 2020