BFI selection criteria questioned after female boxers allege favouritism

NEW DELHI: The Boxing Federation of India’s (BFI) selection criteria to pick the national team for the forthcoming Asian Championships in Ulaanbaatar on Monday ran into a controversy after two leading female boxers, Neeraj Phogat and Jyoti Gulia, alleged favouritism and manipulation of results in the selection of the 20-member contingent for the continental meet, scheduled from March 28 to April 11 in the Mongolian capital.

Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SUBSCRIBE NOW!As per the BFI’s policy, the finalists at the Asian meet in approved weight categories will be selected as India’s direct entries for the Glasgow CWG and Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games, to be held later this year. Both Neeraj and Jyoti missed out on selection for the Ulaanbaatar meet after failing a month-long evaluation test conducted by the BFI. The federation discontinued the practice of holding an open selection trial for boxers, as had been the norm, and instead introduced a performance-based assessment process, where the BFI officials and coaches have a final say.

Former Youth World champion Jyoti finished third in rankings behind Nikhat Zareen and Nitu Ghanghas in the 51kg category. World Boxing Cup (WBC) Finals’ bronze winner Neeraj lost her place in the national camp after finishing outside the ranking bracket in her 65kg weight division. The four boxers selected in her weight class were Ankushita Boro, Sneha, Pranjal Yadav and Kajal. “While certain procedures may appear compliant with BFI guidelines on paper, in practice, there is evident favouritism, manipulation, and misuse of authority.

Policies are being drafted and implemented in a manner that disproportionately benefits certain preferred boxers, particularly from the Services team, thereby compromising transparency and fairness in the selection process,” Neeraj wrote in her complaint to SAI director general (DG) Hari Ranjan Rao.

“I request your office to order a thorough and impartial inquiry into the above-mentioned irregularities; constitute a high-level independent committee to investigate the selection procedures and review and revoke the current evaluation process and reinstate transparent open trials,” she added. Jyoti, too, wrote a mail to Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS) CEO, N S Johal, and requested a review of assessment and trial bouts while alleging favouritism. “During the competition trials, I convincingly outperformed my opponents with a clear margin (approximately 15–20 points), which can be objectively verified through the official video recordings. Despite these performances, I was placed at Rank 3 in my weight category. This outcome has caused me serious concern, as it does not appear to reflect the performance demonstrated during both the assessment tests and the trial bouts.

In the interest of fairness and justice, I request a thorough and impartial review of my trial videos, assessment scores, and evaluation criteria applied in my case,” she said.