Indian hockey’s ‘Soorma’ Sandeep Singh caught on wrong foot as Haryana minister - Hindustan Times
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Indian hockey’s ‘Soorma’ Sandeep Singh caught on wrong foot as Haryana minister

By, Chandigarh
Jan 04, 2023 01:01 AM IST

Can Haryana’s sports minister Sandeep Singh bounce back from setback of sexual misconduct allegations like he defied a life-threatening gunshot wound 16 years ago to achieve hockey glory or is it an abrupt end to a short-lived political career? An accidental gunshot had pierced through the lower abdomen of Sandeep Singh in August 2006 when he was a rising star of Indian hockey

Can Haryana’s sports minister Sandeep Singh bounce back from setback of sexual misconduct allegations like he defied a life-threatening gunshot wound 16 years ago to achieve hockey glory or is it an abrupt end to a short-lived political career?

Sixteen years after surviving the deadly gunshot and remaining the talking point in every rival camp for his fierce drag-flicks, Haryana minister Sandeep Singh is now battling a barrage of sexual misconduct charges that a junior woman coach has levelled.
Sixteen years after surviving the deadly gunshot and remaining the talking point in every rival camp for his fierce drag-flicks, Haryana minister Sandeep Singh is now battling a barrage of sexual misconduct charges that a junior woman coach has levelled.

An accidental gunshot had pierced through the lower abdomen of Sandeep Singh in August 2006 when he was a rising star of Indian hockey. The Shahbad-born lad from a middle-class Sikh family of Kurukshetra district was on his way to Delhi to join his teammates when the freak incident took place on board the Kalka-Shatabdi Express. The gun of a railway security official, who was seated behind him, went off accidentally. It was a life-threatening injury and body blow to the national hockey team.

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Then a 20-year-old strapping sardar, he was India’s youngest player in the 2004 Olympics in Athens (Greece) and confined to the wheelchair for over a year. Sceptics had written off his hockey career. But Sandeep bounced back with a bang and went on to play a key role in India winning a silver medal in the 2008 Azlan Shah Cup. In January 2009, he was rewarded and made captain of the national hockey team. Before calling it a day on the hockey field, the 2010 Arjuna Award winner made a mark as India’s finest and fastest drag-flick specialist, who netted 170 goals in international matches and earned the sobriquet of Flicker Singh.

Exit from cabinet imminent?

Sixteen years after surviving the deadly gunshot and remaining the talking point in every rival camp for his fierce drag-flicks, Sandeep is now battling a barrage of sexual misconduct charges that a junior woman coach has levelled.

The Manohar Lal Khattar-led BJP-JJP coalition government is under mounting pressure to sack Sandeep from the cabinet. Incidentally, he is the lone turbaned Sikh in the 90-member Haryana Vidhan Sabha.

The controversy around his alleged escapades as state sports minister threatens to blemish his reputation beyond repair and abruptly end his political innings, three years after becoming a BJP legislator from the Sikh-dominated Pehowa assembly segment.

On January 1, hours after it emerged that Chandigarh Police have booked him for outraging the modesty of a junior athletics coach posted in Haryana, he announced to give up the sports portfolio, but he continues to remain minister of state for printing and stationery and has denied the misconduct charges.

Political observers say his exit from the Khattar cabinet is imminent even as the chief minister defended him, saying the allegations against the minister were “wild” and the next course of action will be decided after Chandigarh Police, where the case was registered, complete the probe.

Battleground Pehowa

Sandeep is the first Olympian from Haryana to enter the assembly. Olympic bronze medallist wrestler Yogeshwar Dutt and Commonwealth Games gold medallist wrestler Babita Phogat had unsuccessfully contested the last elections as BJP candidates.

Pehowa was a traditional stronghold of the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) and the Congress until the BJP fielded Sandeep and wrested the seat. Incidentally, it was from the INLD office that the woman coach accused the minister of sexual misconduct last week.

According to a Haryana government employee and a family friend of Sandeep, the BJP central leadership had sounded the former Olympian to prepare for the October 2019 assembly elections. “The first thing we did was to get him registered as a voter. The BJP had told him that Pehowa would be his political battleground,” the aide said, requesting anonymity.

Before taking the political plunge, Sandeep quit the Haryana Police service, where he was appointed deputy superintendent of police by the then Bhupinder Singh Hooda-led Congress government.

The gamble paid off and the BJP won Pehowa for the first time.

Sandeep was rewarded with a berth in the cabinet for having defeated former cabinet minister and four-time MLA Harmohinder Singh’s son Mandeep Chattha of the Congress by 5,314 votes. The hockey player got 42,613 votes, while his rival polled 37,299 votes.

Spot on in assembly

As sports minister, Sandeep is credited with working for the welfare of sportspersons, such as increasing the honorarium of national sports award winners and improving infrastructure in Haryana. In the assembly, his participation has been confined to issues concerning the two departments he held.

His response to issues concerning his department, howsoever tricky, has been precise and better than senior BJP ministers, who often fumble.

Comeback after setback

According to a sports journalist who has tracked Sandeep’s career closely, he was embroiled in a controversy that could end his hockey career.

“Sandeep and another Sikh player left the camp to play in the Belgian league without informing the authorities. Both were dropped for the Azlan Shah tournament and a two-year ban was slapped on them. A written apology pacified the federation that paved the way for his entry into the team hotel again,” said the journalist, requesting anonymity.

Sandeep used to be the key in deep defence and was the drag-flick specialist. When he did not find a place in the Asia Cup hockey team due to an injury, he used the German League stint to prove his mettle.

“Sandeep’s performance in the 2004 Asia Cup in Karachi, where he played a crucial role in India’s 5-2 win over Pakistan, got him a place in the Athens Olympics squad. Call it his luck or grit he is known for bouncing back with vengeance every time he faced a life-threatening wound or hockey career ruining challenges,” the journalist said.

In 2018, a Hindi biopic, Soorma, depicting Sandeep’s prowess in hockey was released. The two-time Olympian (2004 Athens and 2012 London) and captain of the Indian hockey team from January 2009 to December 2010, holds the distinction of being India’s youngest player in the Olympic and record of smashing the world’s fastest drag flick at 145 kmph.

Will he weather this storm, too? The jury is out.

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  • ABOUT THE AUTHOR
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    Pawan Sharma, based in Chandigarh, is Assistant Editor in HT and presently writes on Haryana's politics and governance. During different stints over the past two decades, he covered Punjab extensively for 10 years and before that judiciary and Himachal Pradesh with focus on high-impact news breaking and investigative journalism.

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