Athletics Federation of India

The Athletics Federation of India (AFI) is the apex body in Athletics in India and is responsible for conducting Competitions in the country. It was earlier called as Amateur Athletic Federation of India (AAFI). It is associated with both Asian Athletics Association (AAA) and International Association of Athletics Federations.

History

Athletics Federation of India, then Amateur Athletic Federation of India (AAFI), was formed in 1946 at the initiative of Prof. G.D. Sondhi and Maharaja Yadvindra Singh. Prof. G.D. Sondhi was its first President for a short while, resigning on 13 April 1950. In 2017 AFI made a lot of decision against the interest of the country and avoided qualified PU Chitra from attending 2017 World Championships in Athletics. This organisation is corrupted and need a complete system cleaning to ensure the qualified athlete are selected instead of kith and kin of AFI members.

Competitions

The Competitions, conducted by the AFI, are divided in three categories “I”, “II” & “III”. Category I is solely conducted by AFI where as Category II includes all those Competitions, for which AFI grant permission to any other party, affiliated Units/Clubs/Organisations. Category III consists of competitions conducted by AFI but not on regular basis. Our country's valuable junior athletes are now doing exceptionally well as they are in the large group and have an astonishing ability to grab some victorious victories in the international level. Harjeet Singh of Punjab has an astonishing timing in the 100m and the junior national champion Sadanand Kumar of Jharkhand ran his personl best timing of 10.95 sec in the 100m achieving the gold medal. Aditya Kumar Rout of Odisha has an extraordinary timing and performance in the 400 m he is the newest national champion from Odisha with the timing of 48.01 and achieving the gold medal in the junior federation championship and a silver medal in 400m in junior national championship he has also been performing well in the 200 m and achieved a timing of 22.09 sec in the 200m in recent championships.

Controversies

AFI has been under pressure for the last several years due to doping scandals. The entire 4x400m women`s relay that won gold in the 2010 Commonwealth Games were tested positive for anabolic steroid.

The governing body's selection process for international teams have received public criticism. PU Chitra, Ajay Kumar Saroj and Sudha Singh were excluded from the 2017 World Championships in Athletics despite being eligible for entry by the International Association of Athletics Federations (the global governing body). Chitra lodged an appeal to the Kerala High Court in July 2017, though she was ultimately excluded as the court's request for inclusion was beyond the selection cut-off date. Commentator KP Mohan believed the right decision had been made to not include Chitra and several other Asian champions, given their low international ranking at that time, though he stated the controversy could have been avoided if the AFI had made its selection criteria clear before the start of the athletics season.[1]

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References
  1. Mohan, KP (2017-07-31). Utter mess: India’s athletics body took the right call with PU Chitra but handled it poorly. Scroll. Retrieved 2020-03-03.
  • History of Physical Education and Sports By Ram Mohun Mojumdar
  • History, Foundation of Physical Education and Educational Psychology By Tahir P. Hussain


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