Pune: Suresh Kalmadi has been voted out as president of the Asian Athletics Association (AAA) 18-20 by Qatari Dahlan al-Hamad after a whopping seven ballots were shockingly found invalid in his home town here on Monday.
Thus ended Kalmadi’s 13-year run as the boss of Asian athletics and with it his only remaining major sports office. Kalmadi was voted out at the 20th Congress of the continental body here on Monday.
He has already quit as president of the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) in the wake of his arrest and charge sheet in the financial irregularities case connected with the 2010 Commonwealth Games.
Curiously, Kalmadi unseated Indonesian Bob Hassan 19-15 in his backyard in Jakarta and history repeated when he was defeated on his home turf here.
Though Kalmadi has stated that he had no issues with the vote, his supporters were unwilling to digest the count of invalid votes.
“It is too much of a coincidence to believe that seven members in an electoral college of 45 losing their vote for some strange reason. But then in a democratic vote such things do happen. These invalid votes are as good as walking out or abstaining to facilitate a vote in a particular direction,” said a delegate to the congress.
Kalmadi, who is out on bail after serving nine months in a Delhi jail for his alleged involvement in New Delhi Commonwealth Games scams, had the numbers despite the Arab camp favouring the Qatari, a senior AAA vice-president.
Kalmadi’s election campaign was spearheaded by his close confidante Lalit Bhanot, who is also out on bail in Commonwealth Games corruption case, and he was confident of the victory of the Congress MP from Pune. (IANS)
