Shooting legend Debevec hits out at Abhinav Bindra

TIL Desk Sports/ The International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) and its Athletes Committee headed by Abhinav Bindra, on Tuesday received brickbats from three-time Olympic medallist Rajmond Debevec, who said gender equality in the 2020 Olympic Games could have been achieved without scrapping the existing three events. According to the International Olympic Committee’s Olympic Agenda 2020, all international sports federations are to make changes to their sport to promote gender equality by the Tokyo Games.

In line with the IOC directive, the ISSF has proposed some changes, where double trap along with men’s rifle prone and 50m pistol are likely to be dropped from the Olympics to allow new events that will see more women shooters participate in the Olympics.  The recommendations came from the athletes committee, led by the India’s Olympic gold medallist Bindra.

 “I as a shooter feel offended because the ISSF led this procedure and accepted the recommendations in a non transparent manner. I feel there was a lack of democracy.  “The statutory rules of the ISSF demands that such a crucial change be adopted in the general assembly, which was not the case here,” Debevec, a gold medal winner at the Sydney Olympics besides being a five-time World Championship medallist, said.