LAHORE: Pakistan Sports Board has taken up a new role as election commissioner for national federations, with its Director General stating it will be on a case-to-case basis.

The country’s sports regulatory body marked a first when it conducted elections of the national tenpin bowling, alpine club and bodybuilding federations here at the National Sports and Coaching Centre on Friday.

Candidates for the Pakistan Tenpin Bowling Federation and the Alpine Club of Pakistan had already been elected unoppposed while Tariq Hassan was elected president of the Pakistan Bodybuilding Federation.

The elections came after the PSB had recently amended its constitution, forming an election commission to hold elections of the national federations — an act against the International Olympic Committee Charter which limits government intervention in sporting federations.

Grants to PHF put on hold until audit

PSB DG Yasir Pirzada told reporters that the role of holding elections was taken after a verdict by the Supreme Court, adding that PSB’s election commissioner Waseem Majid Malik had attended last month’s elections of the Pakistan Football Federation as an observer.

“The PSB will consider cases of federations where there are parallel bodies or where unconstitutional ways are being adopted before stepping in as election commissioner,” he added, when asked why it hadn’t taken up a leading role in the PFF elections.

On a day that saw Pakistan’s national hockey team overcome France to reach the FIH Nations Cup final in Malaysia, Yasir informed that the Pakistan Hockey Federation had been given the financial support it had asked for, hinting there would be no more.

Asked that the PHF is claiming it doesn’t have funds to pay daily allowances to the team, Yasir informed that “the PHF has been given what it demanded … free air-tickets as well as increased baggage allowance”.

“The PHF has given us in writing that it has ample funds to so we gave what we were asked for,” he added.

A copy of that letter is available with Dawn in which the PHF had stated that it had the required US$51,296 for the accommodation and meal charges of the team in Malaysia and only asked the PSB for a no-objection certificate as it couldn’t shift the amount in foreign exchange.

“Pakistan Hockey Federation is maintaining [an] account in Habib Bank Limited, Lahore, having enough funds for the said payment,” the letter said.

“But as per the policy and rules of State Bank of Pakistan, Remittance of foreign currency is not allowed. You are requested to please take up the matter for the payment as ‘No Objection Certificate’ for remitting of foreign currency for the said payment from the Finance Ministry, Islamabad and the State Bank of Pakistan.”

Well-informed sources, however, have told Dawn that the PHF later requested that the PSB release the same amount as accommodation charges.

They added that the PSB will not be releasing any grant to the PHF until it submits the audit reports of the grants issued to it in the last two years.

It is learnt that in the last two years, the PHF received a total grant of Rs119.667 million from the PSB.

Published in Dawn, June 21st, 2025