India Taekwondo directed to register names for Asian Championships

New Delhi, May 31

The Delhi High Court has directed India Taekwondo officials to forward the names of Indian athletes for the upcoming Asian Taekwondo Poomsae Championships to World Taekwondo for timely registration.

This direction came following a review petition filed by the Sports Authority of India (SAI) after failing to get India Taekwondo on board.

“The respondent No.6 is (India Taekwondo) accordingly directed to forthwith submit/forward the names of the athletes selected by the respondent No.4 (SAI) to the World Federation of India so as to enable them to participate in 6th Poomsae & 25th Asian Taekwondo Championships,” the order said.

“The said communication will be accompanied not only by a copy of the order dated 28.04.2022 passed by this Court but also today’s order and without any extraneous comments or observations being made in this regard by respondent No.6. In order to facilitate respondent No.6 in carrying out these directions, the respondent No.4 will within two hours forward the names of the selected candidates to respondent No.6,” it added.

The April order of the Delhi High Court had directed SAI to organise the selection meet as India Taekwondo was not a recognised national sports federation.

However, World Taekwondo had put a spanner in the works and issued a letter saying that any team selected by SAI will not be recognised by the world body.

Importantly, India Taekwondo’s counsel opposed the petition, saying, “…that since the names of these athletes who are desirous of representing India have been selected not by the respondent no.6, but by respondent no.4/Sports Authority of India (SAI), the respondent no.6 is not in a position to certify that the team has been selected by said respondent.”