Volleyball will not be part of the upcoming National Games. This comes as a huge blow to the sport especially after India’s good outing at the Asian Games recently. The Men’s team finished sixth in the event. The decision to withdraw from the upcoming National Games was taken by the ad-hoc committee that runs the Volleyball Federation of India.
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The upcoming National Games will be hosted by Goa. The multi-sport event is scheduled to be held from October 26 to November 9. Volleyball was one among the record 43 sports to be featured in this edition of the National Games. However according to a report from Sportstar, the ad-hoc committee cited lack of time to determine the eight teams that will play in the tournament as the reason behind the decision for the sport to be dropped.
“We are in a situation where we cannot recommend eight teams without any dispute happening afterwards. We don’t have an undisputed criteria to qualify the teams. If we select eight teams, we should be able to defend it. That’s the problem faced by the ad-hoc committee,” said S Gopinath, a member of the ad-hoc committee as quoted by Sportstar.
Why is the ad-hoc committe running the VFI?
The Volleyball Federation of India has been under suspension since 2019. The various reasons for the suspension includes infighting, proxy voting and absence of Internal complaints Committee. The Federation has been placed under an ad-hoc committee formed by the Indian Olympic Association since June this year.
The ad-hoc committee was busy with the Asian Games selection since their appointment. “All were engaged with the Asian Championship and the Asian Games. We have to conduct the Nationals only after that. There is no sufficient time,” said Gopinath.
In the last edition of the National Games, Kerala won the gold medal in both the Men and the Women’s disciplines.
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