NOC delay costs Pak TT squad a berth in ITTF Asian event

LAHORE: Delay in the issuance of No Objection Certificate (NOC) by the Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) has denied Pakistan table tennis players a ticket to the 24th ITTF Asian Table Tennis Championship.

An eight-member Pakistani squad including Bilal Yasin, Faizan Zahoor, Fahad Khan, Obaid Shah, Awais Hassan, Shabnam Bilal, Fatima Khan and Perniya Zaman along with two delegates Saba Waris and Haji Ahsan were to participate in the Championship, which would also serve qualifiers for 2020 Tokyo Olympics, scheduled to be held at Yogyakarta, Indonesia from September 16 to 22.

Saba Waris informed Wednesday that the Federation had applied for the NOC four weeks prior to the event on August 15. “The PSB said it did not receive our request, therefore we resend the hard copy through TCS on August 24 but it was also not delivered to the Board. Therefore, I sent an official in person to receive the copy from TCS and forward it to PSB by hand on August 28,” he said.

Saba said PSB sent the NOC to the Ministry of Interior on September 6 which was a week later after they received the request from the Federation. “It was Friday on September 6, followed by the weekend (Saturday and Sunday) and the holidays of 9th and 10th Muharram (Monday and Tuesday),” he said and added the PSB delayed in forwarding the NOC to the Ministry of Interior.

To a question, he said if PSB had felt that the Federation sent a late request for the NOC, than why didn’t the Board refused at the first place.When contacted, Director PSB General Arif Ibrahim was quoted by a national news agency that the NOC had been granted to Pakistani team for participation in the event. “We received the request for NOC on August 28 and forwarded it to the Ministry of Inter Provincial Coordination (IPC) on September 2 which further forwarded it to the Ministry of Interior on September 6,” he said and added it was mandatory for the Federations to apply for NOC six to eight weeks prior to the events.