Vinesh Phogat, a renowned Indian wrestler, says the top athletes will fight on and fight back hard in their legal battle after the court verdict in Delhi for former WFI president Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh in a high-profile sexual harassment case. Six prominent wrestlers such as Vinesh Phogat accused Brij Bhushan of sexual harassment during his time in charge of the national sports governing body.
The allegations triggered massive, unprecedented protests in 2023 when world class Olympic medallists and national wrestlers rallied at Delhi's Jantar Mantar. Their main demands were the immediate arrest of Brij Bhushan and removal of him from sports administration. The protests drew widespread national and international attention as a number of protesting athletes were held up by police even as they marched on the newly opened Parliament building and international sporting bodies quickly mobilized in opposition to their charges. With strong pressure from the sport community and the urgent action by the Supreme Court, Delhi Police filed a First Information Report on Brij Bhushan and his co-accused Vinod Tomar. Vinesh later went public and disclosed her own experiences about the incident in the beginning - she said she was among those targeted, while the former WFI chief denied all the charges.
Vinesh Phogat expressed disappointment over the court’s verdict in the case of Brij Bhushan on social media. She described the audacity of athletes to go out onto the streets and fight a legal fight against a powerful politician and the fear. Phogat claimed that political power and government backing were used by the accused to intimidate some of the complainants into dropping their names but she said nobody wanted to leave the court and that the girls had never given up. The legal team is already on the list to appeal the decision and so far the athletes are not giving up hope at all,” she said.
Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh’s reaction to the court’s decision, as opposed to the athletes’ reaction, was that he felt vindicated that he had done so in a very personal way. Speaking to reporters after the judgement, he said the judiciary had cleared himself and Vinod Tomar with honor. He said he always felt that if any charges were true he would go to jail and he was ready to face the most severe punishment if it was true. He said the truth had finally come out and that ended a turbulent phase in the life of the former sports administrator and it paved the way for the continuation of legal battles in higher courts.
