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The Mucky world of Hockey India

I had been preparing and researching for a blog based on upcoming Hockey India elections.

Vidya Stokes is one of the tallest leaders of Indian National Congress in the state of Himachal Pradesh. She is also President of Women's Hockey In India.
She is 83 years old. And now wants to lead the entire Hockey bureaucracy in India.

The Sports minister, another Congressman, says that you should be maximum 70 years old to contest the Hockey India elections, otherwise no funds or facilities or support from the Sports ministry would be provided. Hockey India says, to hell with government support, we need a 83 year old person to lead hockey today.

Now, I wanted to write about this in detail, but news channels are showing some very sleazy pictures of a middle aged man smooching and making loving with some very white looking females. The videographer or video analyst as you may call him, has self clicked those pictures to perhaps tell we the Indians, how to up hold integrity of your Nation whenever you are abroad. He himself indulged in prostitutes while the team was touring China and Canada. Sports well is ....

It takes a bit time to digest such things, especially when every news channel of repute is showing you such photographs. But the world of Hockey India is merciless. Hockey is our national sport. It is our national pride. So immediately after this news, we have allegations against the women team coach, Kaushik for allegedly sexually harassing girls and using vulgar language.

It turns out that this coach story is the most interesting. Earlier anonymous complaints about him were largely ignored. But this time around, one of the girls wrote her name and lodged a formal complaint with the Sports Ministry. Since we Indians are very intelligent people, Hockey India decided to make a committee to probe into this. But since they have excellent sense of humor, they did not include any female into this committee.
Anyway, common sense later prevailed one lady was made part of this committee, while efforts were being made to brush the matter under the carpet.

Now, news channels love scandals. Scandals ensure good TRPs and good business. Hence, such an exciting looking scandal should not die so soon. So, as the matter began to die, they brought up ex- players of the women hockey team, who all in unison pointed fingers at the coach's character.

My only question now is

After knowing all this, which parent would send his/her daughter to play hockey with head held high?

Does hockey really deserve the status of National Sport?

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