NEW DELHI, May 28: The Wrestling Federation of India has moved the Supreme Court challenging the Delhi High Court’s order allowing the Olympic medallist wrestler Vinesh Phogat to compete in the selection trials for the coming Asian Games.
The plea is expected to come up before bench of Justices PS Narsimha and Alok Aradhe on Friday.
The Delhi High court had on May 22 in an order allowed participation of Ms Phogat in the selection trials setting aside the show cause notice issued to her by the WFI disallowing her permission to participate in the selection trials for the Asian Games. A division bench of the High Court had pointed out that the WFI’s selection policy was exclusionary for the lack of discretion to consider an iconic player like her, who is returning from a maternity break.
The High Court had ordered that the selection trials, to be held on May 30-31, shall be video-recorded by the WFI and an independent observer from the Sports Authority of India (SAI) and the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) each shall also remain present.
The controversy erupted ever since Phogat arrived in Gonda earlier this month and replied to the WFI’s show cause notice claiming that she was eligible to return from retirement. The WFI had maintained that she cannot be allowed to compete in the ongoing National Open Ranking tournament. It also insisted that she cannot compete until disciplinary proceedings against her were completed. The WFI had declared Phogat ineligible to participate in the domestic events at least until June 26 citing the mandatory six-month notice period linked to athletes returning from retirement under anti-doping rules.
Immediately after landing in Ayodhya, Vinesh replied to the WFI’s show-cause notice, claiming that Rule 5.6.1 of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Code concerning retired athletes does not apply to her as she had already informed United World Wrestling (UWW) in June about her decision to resume competition after retirement. In her response, Vinesh argued that she had formally intimated UWW about her comeback well in advance and, therefore, fulfilled the procedural requirements needed to return to competition.
However, WFI said the federation was not satisfied with her reply and felt that the wrestler had addressed only the eligibility aspect while failing to respond comprehensively to the broader disciplinary charges levelled against her in the detailed notice issued earlier.
The controversy erupted after WFI issued a strongly worded show-cause notice to the celebrated wrestler, accusing her of indiscipline, breach of federation rules and anti-doping related procedural violations. Before that, Vinesh had claimed that WFI was trying to block her entry.
The WFI also maintained that a “wrong narrative” was being spread that the selection criteria for the National Open Ranking Tournament had been altered specifically to prevent Vinesh from competing. Vinesh had announced her retirement from the sport after her disqualification from the women’s 50kg gold medal bout at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
While her husband said Vinesh never announced her retirement officially, and merely posted it on social media, WFI has maintained that a communication from UWW in December 2024 acknowledged that she had intimated the International Testing Agency (ITA) about her retirement.
Vinesh, on the other hand, has argued that she had subsequently informed the world body about her intention to return and was therefore eligible to enter the tournament in Gonda.
(Manas Dasgupta)