Himachal Pradesh high court directs BFI to allow Anurag Thakur’s nomination in its polls

The Himachal Pradesh high court on Thursday permitted former union minister Anurag Thakur to file his nomination for the upcoming elections to the electoral college of the Boxing Federation of India (BFI), ruling that the BFI’s incumbent president Ajay Singh’s decision to reject Thakur’s nomination was “without any authority and power”.

Justice Ajay Mohan Goel also directed BFI to extend the last date of nomination to enable Thakur to file his nomination to represent the Himachal Pradesh Boxing Association (HPBA), and to “fully participate” in the BFI’s annual general meeting.

The election process would be subject to the final outcome of the writ petition filed before the high court by HPBA.

Thakur, who is also a Lok Sabha MP from Hamirpur, was declared ineligible after a March 7 order by BFI president Ajay Singh, also the SpiceJet chairman and managing director, that rejected Thakur’s nomination to contest for the post of the president on the ground that only elected members of affiliated state boxing associations could contest in the BFI election due on March 28. The impugned notice said Thakur was ineligible to contest since he was not an elected member of HPBA, which he was seeking to represent in the electoral college.

Justice Goel stayed the operation of the notice, and the rejection of nomination.

“This court has no hesitation in holding that prima facie it is evident that notice, dated 07.03.2025 has been issued by respondent No.2 (BFI) without any authority and without any power,” the bench said.

This decision comes a day after the Delhi high court stayed BFI’s March 7 circular, which stated that only duly elected members of the state units affiliated to BFI shall be authorised to represent their respective state or union territories during the election. Acting on a petition moved by the Delhi Amateur Boxing Association seeking annulment of the March 7 circular, the Delhi high court, however, clarified that BFI’s election process shall continue on the scheduled date.

HPBA had approached the Himachal high court, reasoning that Ajay Singh did not have the authority to issue such notice since his tenure as the president was already over. Senior advocate Abhinav Mukerji, who appeared for the association, argued that the notice that rejected his nomination on the ground that only office bearers or elected members of affiliated state units can contest the polls, was arbitrary and had no foundation in any written rules or law.

The high court accepted this argument and underlined that BFI rules made it clear that any decision on nomination and elections to the federation were to be taken by its general council and that the president was merely an individual representative. The president or other office bearers cannot assume the role of the general council, HC said.

The high court also noted that BFI’s electoral college consisted of representatives of each member association. Such affiliated member associations were to be represented by two representatives authorised by the president or the general secretary of BFI. There were no rules that mandated that such representatives must be elected members of the state associations, the high court said.

“A perusal of the Rules and Regulations of respondent number 3 (BFI) demonstrates that the powers and functions of General Council inter alia are to elect office bearers and other members of the Executive Council after every four years,” justice Goel said.

“There is no rider mentioned in the Rules and Regulations that only those persons can be nominated as members by a member association, who are duly elected members during the election AGM duly notified to BFI of the State units etc,” it added.