NEW DELHI: Lifetime member and patron of Hockey India Vidya Stokes on Sunday told The Statesman that the election to the Himachal Pradesh Hockey Association (HPHA) held recently in Una, where Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Anurag Thakur was elected president, was illegal.
Thakur, the former BCCI president who was removed from his position following a Supreme Court directive in January 2017, was only “trying to gain political mileage through sports”, Stokes asserted.
Stokes, a former HI president who was HPHA president prior to this election, said she would take up the issue with the national body.
“Anurag Thakur cannot become the president at his own sweet will,” The Statesman quotes Stokes, a senior Congress leader, as stating, while referring to Thakur as a “self styled president”.
“I had been heading the state hockey association for last many years and am still the president. The elections could not have been held without issuing me a notice, which has not been done,” she said. Stokes alleged that Thakur held the election in haste going against the rules. “He has also been trying to gain political mileage through sports,” she stated.
