The Supreme Court on Tuesday allowed urgent listing of a plea challenging the Delhi High Court order which refused to interfere with the selection of the Indian Dressage team for the upcoming Asian Games 2026.
A Bench of Justice Ahsanuddin Amanullah and Justice R Mahadevan agreed to list the matter for hearing on July 9 (Thursday) after senior counsel sought an urgent hearing.As the matter was mentioned, Justice Amanullah remarked,"Oh it's my favourite sport."Dressage is a horse riding sport where a rider and horse perform a series of precise, predetermined movements in an arena.The litigation stems from petitions filed by dressage riders Anush Agarwalla and Sudipti Hajela, who challenged their exclusion from the final squad after being placed on the reserve list.
The appeal before the Supreme Court challenges a July 6 judgment of a Division Bench of the Delhi High Court, which declined to interfere with the selection of India's Dressage team even though it found that EFI had failed to comply with certain provisions of its own selection criteria.
The Division Bench of Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Tejas Karia held that EFI had not complied with clauses 15(a) and 15(b) of its selection criteria, which required preparation of a list of "probables" before the final team was selected. It also found that EFI had failed to publish the provisional merit list of the probables as mandated under Clause 8(f).
The High Court rejected EFI's explanation that there was insufficient time to complete the prescribed procedure. It said that such reasons did not inspire confidence and the federation had acted with "undue haste" in preparing the selection list.
However, the Court ultimately refused to order a fresh selection exercise after noting that July 15 was the deadline for submitting the final list for the Asian Games and that reopening the process could jeopardise India's participation in the event.The High Court, therefore, disposed of the appeals without interfering with the selected team, while directing EFI to strictly comply with its selection criteria in future.
Earlier, a single-judge of the High Court had dismissed their petitions, holding that the selection process adopted by EFI was fair and in consonance with the applicable selection criteria.
While the Division Bench on Monday identified procedural irregularities in the federation's decision-making process, it declined to upset the final selection due to the imminent deadline for the Asian Games.
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