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Former hockey greats Aslam Sher Khan and M.K. Kaushik interacted with Express staff recently after the Indian team’s failure to make it to the Olympics.

KUNAL PRADHAN: With India’s failure to qualify for the Olympics, all of a sudden, hockey has been in focus. Is there a silver lining in this loss? Does it give us a chance to rectify past wrongs?

M.K. KAUSHIK: A loss can never be a silver lining: nobody wants to lose, everybody wants to play the Olympics. Everyone is dejected, disappointed. I watched the last match against England with the entire women’s team; we had bought sweets to distribute after the match. We never expected the team to lose. The way the team was playing, I thought we would do well. As a coach, after studying and analysing the videotapes and the opponents, I think we could have won the match. We deserved to win. But the way we played against England was disappointing. So this is a very bad sign for hockey.

KUNAL PRADHAN: Everyone talks of how this one match against England cost us a place in the Olympics. But should we not be asking why it came down to winning this one match? Why didn’t India qualify in the first place? Do you think the system is to blame?

M.K. KAUSHIK: The way we select coaches, the way we run our camps, the way we plan things - that’s where the system comes into the equation. Without a system, nothing can happen in any institution and you have to run it honestly. Here, the entire system had flopped.

KUNAL PRADHAN: Do you think the people who are running hockey in the country are not honestly trying to improve hockey?

M.K. KAUSHIK: I think our president understands the system well. He understands what needs to be done but the follow-up is not up to the mark.

KUNAL PRADHAN: Do you see that what has happened now is the result of a general decline or are things really different from what they used to be during your playing days?

M.K. KAUSHIK: Hockey has been on the decline for a long ime. Mr K.P.S. Gill has been president of the federation for 14 years. When we were winning, we defeated many tough opponents; the opponents used to have to prepare hard before playing India. They videotaped our training camp sessions and used them to prepare for matches. We have not been planning well. For the last 20 years, all the momentum has been coming from European nations.

G.S. VIVEK: Why can’t we adopt the European style of playing completely?

M.K. KAUSHIK: We are not physically as strong as the Europeans — we have different kinds of body movements and skills. If you look at Dhyan Chand, his build was not like that of a European. They play rough-and-tough hockey but we are technically sounder. We play a different type of hockey and that is India-Pakistan hockey. As for the technical part, we did no planning. We considered ourselves to be the best. We played on our merits and never listened to others.

KUNAL PRADHAN: Mr Aslam Sher Khan, you strongly believe there is a single reason for that: K.P.S. Gill. If he goes, will everything change?

ASLAM SHER KHAN: Basically, policemen have to leave the system. Hockey was created before independence. When India became independent, the first man to become the president of the hockey federation was J.R.D. Tata. He served till 1960. The first time India lost in the Olympics, he resigned. Ashwini Kumar, IG of Punjab Police, took over and the decline of Indian hockey started and went on till 1975. It was only after the government interfered that Kumar was thrown out of the federation. The Punjab Hockey Association was constituted by the police and its constitution stipulates that only a DG of police will be the president of the Punjab Hockey Association. The Punjab police is a very powerful organisation. So for 16 years hockey suffered. When it started to revive under M.K. Kaushik and the boys did well in 1998, Gill threw out Kaushik and six players.

•KUNAL PRADHAN: Mr Khan, you were with the Bhopal federation head for a long time. You were a manager, you were a selector and you resigned only in 2006. Why did you remain part of the system for so long despite these reservations?

ASLAM SHER KHAN: I played hockey till 1980. I left because I was disgusted. After 2000, I had some time and thought I should help hockey, so I asked to be put in charge of hockey in Bhopal, but Gill refused. He said first become associated with Indian hockey. I agreed. But we were mere puppets in the name of selectors. When I resigned, I wrote a letter to the federation requesting them to get out of the selection committee.

•DEEPAK NARAYANAN: If there is a unanimous view that Mr Gill must go, why is it not possible for everyone to come together and fight an election and take control of the IHF?

ASLAM SHER KHAN: When Sanjay Gandhi was in politics, someone asked him why he didn’t go into sports. He replied, ‘too much politics’. That says everything. To win the IHF elections cost around Rs 1 crore. We can come together but we cannot afford to buy votes.

SHAILAJA BAJPAI: What has exactly do you think is gone wrong with our system?

M.K. KAUSHIK: There are different areas: one is coaching, another is infrastructure. Everything has to be taken care of by the top people who run the show. The Indian Hockey Federation has an executive committee, which decides who will be in charge of coaching, who will take charge of infrastructure and what is the long term plan, how is it to be implemented, etc. They must decide on the criteria for selecting a coach or rejecting a coach. At the moment such decision-making is lacking in our system.

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