High-profile committee on hockey affairs to meet today

ISLAMABAD: The first-ever meeting of the three-member high profile committee, formed under the directive of Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif, has been convened on Wednesday (today).

The committee has been formed to look into hockey affairs and recommend remedial measures for a fresh beginning.

The Committee with Defense Minister Khawaja Asif as its convener includes Federal Ministers Ayaz Sadiq and Ehsanur Rehman Mazari.Besides the committee members, the officials concerned, including Ahmad Hanif Orakzai (Secretary, IPC), Syed Wagar UI Hassan (Additional Secretary IPC), Sarfraz Durrani, Joint Secretary (Sports-IPC), Col (R) Muhammad Asif Zaman (DG, PSB), Irfanullah Khan (Legal Advisor, PSB), Muhammad Shahid, DDG (Tech), PSB and Muhammad Fardos, Section Officer, have been invited to attend the meeting with all relevant documents on the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) activities, audit reports and funding for the last eight years.

The PM who is also the Patron in Chief of the PHF has given all the powers to the high-profile committee to look into the working of the PHF and recommended remedial measures for a better future for the national game.

“The Committee will be all-powerful and have all the authority to check and go through the records of the PHF and invite any official they want to get information regarding the working of the federation and failure to produce results at international level besides looking into numerous audit paras,” an informed source confirmed to ‘The News’.

When asked about the timeframe for finalising recommendations for the Prime Minister's approval, the source confirmed that there was no time limit, yet orally it had been conveyed that the PM wanted a report at the earliest.

“There is no time limit. But since a high-profile committee has been constituted it is believed that the recommendations will be finalised following a few meetings. It will be only a matter of two to three meetings,” the source said.

Meanwhile, it has also been confirmed that the Ministry of Inter-provincial Coordination (IPC) on the recommendations of the NA Standing Committee has initiated a forensic audit of the federation.

The audit is being conducted according to the given mandate.

Since it was the government of Pakistan that doled out millions of rupees in grants to the federation, it is the government's right to conduct an audit of the federation.

The NA Committee has also recommended an audit.