AITA elects new office bearers, hold official declaration of result

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New Delhi, Sep 28 (PTI) The All India Tennis Association (AITA) on Saturday elected unopposed a new set of office bearers but the result was not declared officially as per the directions of the Delhi High Court, which is hearing a petition into Sports Code violations by the federation.

The AITA was to conduct election at its Annual General Meeting (AGM) but there was no need for voting since the Returning Officer received only one nomination for each post.

Apart from getting a new President, secretary general and treasurer, the national tennis federation elected eight vice presidents, four joint secretaries and 10 executive members.

It has been learnt that initially Rohit Rajpal and one more candidate had filed their nominations for the post of President but later India's non-playing Davis Cup captain withdrew his candidature.

Former India players Somdev Devvarman and Purav Raja had sought a stay on the AITA elections, claiming that the federation was not following the Sports Code and several candidates in fray were ineligible to contest the polls.

The Court did not stay the elections but asked AITA and the Sports Ministry to file their response. "The Election shall remain subject to the outcome of the instant writ petition. Let the result of the Election be placed in a sealed cover by the Election Officer, meaning thereby, the result of the Election shall not be published," the Court said.

The matter will be heard on October 14. Till that time, the outgoing team and the new team will jointly take care of the federation work.

The AITA held the Annual General Meeting, where they discussed plans to make tennis more popular across the country, reaching out to rural areas and finding big sponsors to support their efforts.

"The Annual General Meeting was a great success; the house approved the activities of the honorary secretary General report the financial reports where auditory reports were passed, and we also took some very interesting decisions," AITA Secretary General Anil Dhupar told PTI videos.

"Primarily, it was discussed how to make tennis more popular, how we can get into more developmental plans for tennis across the country.

"Although we are already doing many tournaments and lots of coaching and officiating courses - how to increase and make beneficial things for Indian tennis, how to take tennis through the rural market and of course all this is needed to be supported financially, so we also decided that we must approach few big sponsors who can come and join hands with All India Tennis Association."