Pakistan's kabaddi star Ubaidullah Rajput has been banned indefinitely by the national federation on Sunday (December 28). The reason for the ban is that Rajput represented a team from India during a recent private sporting event in Bahrain. Reports state that Rajput not only represented an Indian team was also seen waving the Indian national flag after the match.
The decision to ban Rajput was taken after an emergency meeting by the Pakistan Kabaddi Federation (PKF). The 32-year-old is guilty of not obtaining the mandatory 'No Objection Certificate' (NOC) before participating in this competition. However, Rajput claims that he wasn't aware of representing an Indian team till he arrived at the event.
Rajput has the right to defend his actions before a disciplinary committee that has been appointed to investigate this matter further. PKF officials are not only upset with Rajput for playing without NOC but also miffed due to the obvious reason of representing an Indian team. Especially given the recently escalated levels of political rivalry between the two neighbouring countries.
“He (Rajput) has claimed it was a total misunderstanding and he was never told the team he would play for in the private tournament would be an Indian side. But he is still guilty of flouting NOC rules,” said PKF chief Rana Sarwar as quoted by Sportstar.
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Apart from Rajput, other players who have committed the offence of playing without NOCs have also been banned. When contacted on this topic, the veteran kabaddi player was adamant that this was an unintentional mistake from his part. Problems arose for Rajput when the videos of him wearing Indian jersey and covering himself with the Indian national flag went viral on social media.
"I didn’t know until later they had named the side Indian team and I told the organisers to not use names of India and Pakistan," said Rajput to Sportstar.
In private competitions in the past, Indian and Pakistan players have played together for a private team but never under the names of India or Pakistan. I found out later that I was misrepresented as playing for the Indian team which I can’t think of doing after the conflict.”