Anju elected athletics body’s Sr V-P, Sumariwalla remains prez

New Delhi, Oct 31 : Anju Bobby George, the 2003 Athletics World Championships bronze medallist, was on Saturday elected as the Athletics Federation of India’s (AFI) senior vice-president while Olympian Adille Sumariwalla was president for a third time at an AFI annual general meeting (AGM).
“I have taken up other roles before this. Having served the country as an athlete and winning laurels for the country at the highest level, I believe I can connect well with all athletes and coaches to take India forward,” Anju, 43, said in a statement.
Ravinder Chaudhary and Madhukant Pathak were elected secretary and treasurer respectively. Former long-distance runner Suman Rawat Mehta (vice-president), former middle-distance runner C Latha (joint secretary) and A Hyma (executive council member) were all elected to the executive council for the four-year term.
Sumariwalla, a former national sprint champion, expressed hope that the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) would resume testing soon even as he encouraged state associations to “actively seek the help of their respective state governments to ensure that athletics competitions could resume sooner than later”.
“We hope the NADA will resume testing without any loss of time,” he said.
“In response to claims by some non-members about the legality of Mr. Sumariwalla’s nomination for his third term, AFI clarified that he filed nomination not only as a president of Maharashtra Athletics Association but also as outgoing AFI president, as permitted by AFI Constitution (Clause XXVIII.A.e) which specifies the president need not require representation either to sit in meetings or even to contest election for the next tenure,” the AFI statement said.