Wrestlers vs WFI chief: 'Expect Sunday's maha panchayat to be a huge success' - Protesting grapplers

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The protesting wrestlers hope that the khap maha panchayat scheduled at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi on Sunday will be of enormous success and will help get more support for them in their fight against Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) chief Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh. The country's top wrestlers, including Bajrang Punia, Sakshi Malik and Vinesh Phogat, have been protesting for the last two weeks at the Jantar Mantar here, demanding the sacking of Brij Bhushan as WFI chief and his arrest because of the alleged sexual harassment of women grapplers.

"Today [Saturday] is the 14th day of our sit-in protest at Jantar Mantar. You guys [supporters] are here, and we are here too. We want to thank everyone sitting with us here and supporting us. We want to thank the entire country for standing with us in this fight for justice. We hope we will succeed in this fight so that truth prevails," said Vinesh on Saturday.

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Vinesh urged the supporters to be peaceful on Sunday so bad elements do not hijack the protest. "Tomorrow, many people are expected to join us from villages... khap panchayats, kisan and mazdoor unions, student organisations to support us. We appeal to everyone to be peaceful. Our success depends on a peaceful demonstration. We also request all who will come tomorrow to cooperate with authorities and police. We also request the police not to stop our supporters tomorrow," said the Asian Games gold medallist.

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Bajrang, an Olympic medallist, has appealed to his fellow citizens to observe a candlelight march on Sunday to show solidarity with the protesting grapplers. "We request all Indians to come out with a candlelight march at 7 pm on May 7," he said. Another Olympic medallist, wrestler Sakshi Malik, said they are yet to decide the future course of action as their lawyers are still working on it. She said the decision to approach a lower court as directed by the Supreme Court could be taken only after the Delhi Police expedites the inquiry and records statements of all the complainants.

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"We have discussed this with our lawyers. Our statements are yet to be recorded. We have been waiting for that. The police have been given a deadline to complete the recording of statements within a time frame. Once the statement is recorded, only then can the case proceed further. We request the police to record our statements as soon as possible," she said.

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Asked whether Sports Minister Anurag Thakur had approached them, she said: "There is no approach from his side. He already knows our demands, so meeting him again doesn't make sense. If he wants to talk to us, we will talk." Bajrang said the two committees formed on Saturday have the full authority to decide their future course of action.

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The wrestlers had on Friday formed two committees to advise them on the future course of action in their fight against Brij Bhushan. "We have formed two committees, and whatever they decide, we will abide by that. The committee will decide the entire framework of the protest," concluded Bajrang.

(With inputs from PTI)