NEW DELHI: International Hockey Federation (FIH) and Indian Olympic Association (IOA) president Narinder Dhruv Batra has confirmed his intention to contest the upcoming elections of the world governing body of hockey for a second term.
FIH will hold the election in May.
“I herewith have the honour and the pleasure to announce my candidacy to continue to be your President beyond the upcoming Congress, should you wish me to do so,” a letter to written by Batra and accessed by ANI reads.
“In the last four years, I’ve done my best and put all my energy to enable FIH to fulfil its missions – in particular the development of hockey globally, add new objectives and steadily improve its management for the good of hockey,” the letter states.
Batra referred to FIH’s recent achievements and decisions and said that since 2016, the federation launched its global home-and-away league – the FIH Hockey Pro League, created other new events – the FIH Nations Cup as well as the FIH Hockey5s World Cup and World Tour.
He said it staged numerous online courses, signed new commercial partners, increased its social media audiences and produced a global and modern app – Watch. Hockey.
Batra said FIH engaged with athletes to have hockey benefit from their influencers’ status, improved its good governance, pushed its digitalization and decided to get rid of watered turf in the near future.
“All these achievements wouldn’t have been possible without your strong commitment to hockey as well as your trust. The experience of the last five years, coupled with your numerous encouragements and my strong dedication, have convinced me that I should make myself available to pursue my mission at the helm of FIH,” the letter further reads.
The nomination for FIH’s president role began on February 12 and the last date to register is March 12.
