Sakshi Malik cried after Brij Bhushan’s aide was elected WFI chief
New Delhi: Olympic medalist Sakshi Malik, who was the face of wrestlers’ protest against former WFI president Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh over sexual harassment allegations, on Thursday announced that she would contest the election of her colleague Sanjay Singh as the federation president. After leaving wrestling.
Sakshi Malik became distraught and emotional and started crying while leaving the venue after addressing a press conference in the national capital.
He placed his shoes on the table when announcing his decision to quit wrestling at the press conference.
He said, “We slept on the streets for 40 days and a lot of people from many parts of the country came to support us. If Brij Bhushan Singh’s business partner and close associate is elected President of WFI, I will quit wrestling.” He was accompanied by some other wrestlers who were part of the protest.
“We have demanded a woman president. If the president is a woman then there will be no harassment. But, earlier there was no participation of women and today you can see the list, not even a single woman was given the post.” He said, “We fought with all our strength but this fight will continue. The new generation wrestlers will have to fight.”
World Championship and Asian Games medalist Vinesh Phogat also expressed deep disappointment and said that the future of wrestling is bleak and wrestlers are still fighting.
“There are very few expectations but we are hopeful that we will get justice,” he said. It is sad that the future of wrestling is in darkness. “Who should we tell our grief to?… We are fighting even during training.”
Sanjay Singh was elected the new president of the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) on Thursday.
The Indian Wrestling Federation elections were held on Thursday after several postponements in the beginning of the year.
The panel led by Sanjay Singh won the WFI elections. The second panel got seven votes.
“National camps (for wrestling) will be organised,” Singh told reporters. Wrestlers who want to do politics can do politics, those who want to wrestle will wrestle.”
Sanjay Singh served on the previous Executive Council of WFI. Since 2019, he has also served as the joint secretary of the national federation.
The WFI elections were originally scheduled to take place on 12 August. However, the Punjab and Haryana High Court, hearing a petition in August, extended the stay on the WFI elections till September 25. Elections to the federation, which oversees wrestling in the country, were planned to begin in June this year.
Earlier this month, Bajrang Punia and Sakshi Malik met Union Sports Minister Anurag Thakur at his residence in the national capital to discuss the WFI elections.
Sakshi’s husband Satyavrat Kadian, who is himself a wrestler, was among those who met the minister. Speaking to reporters after the meeting, the wrestlers said that they have been assured that the government will keep its promise that no one related or close to Brij Bhushan will get a post in the WFI.
