The Invisible Korean Hand In Injustice To Sarita

Now Sarita faces the severest punishment meted out for her lack of sportsmanship - a ban from the ring for life by AIBA, unless some influential officials of the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) and International Olympic Committee (IOC) plead on her behalf to treat her leniently considering the emotional stress she was in. But the OCA has a sort of exonerated her by reinstating her bronze medal.

Boxing bouts are notorious for subjective considerations. It is too much of a coincidence that apart from Sarita and Devendro there was another bout involving yet another South Korean and it went against a Mongolian boxer.

What defies boxing logic is that all three judges gave the bout to the Korean, making it amply clear that the decision was taken even before the boxer got into the ring!

Mary Kom, the flyweight gold medallist quipped "of course Park won because she is Korean" and that sums it up.

In sport, the people controlling international federations have enormous clout. For over three decades Pakistan's late Anwar Chaudhry ran AIBA with an iron fist, first as secretary general and then as president before he was overthrown by the incumbent president Chinese Tapei's Chin-Kuo Wu in 2006.

An engineering professor, Chaudhry was ruthless. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) questioned his selection of judges and referees and even stopped grants to AIBA until there is fair play in that sport. He was even accused of manipulating results, making Pakistani boxers victors.  He lost his post eventually facing the usual allegations of embezzlement of AIBA funds. Still, he managed to poll 79 votes to Wu's 83 and it only shows how well he took care of his vote bank.

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