The meeting in progress. Picture by Srinivas

Jamshedpur, June 6: The steel city feels short-changed. Jharkhand Olympic Association today shifted equestrian from here to Ranchi, reducing for the second time Jamshedpur’s list of events for the 34th National Games.

“The city lacks infrastructure to host equestrian. The Indian Olympic Association steering committee also felt the same way during a visit here last year. It will now be held in Ranchi,” said Syed Matloob Hashmi, secretary general of JOA, the state’s apex sports body.

The city will now be hosting four low profile events — archery, boxing, weightlifting and women’s football. A further change is also not discounted.

The JOA and the sports ministry three years ago had proposed eight events to be held in the steel city — archery, karate, judo, badminton, water sports, boxing, handball and weightlifting. Earlier, handball, karate, judo and water sports (rowing, kayaking and canoeing) were shifted to the state capital and Dhanbad.

Hashmi parried a question on why JOA proposed the events for Jamshedpur when it lacked infrastructure. “Allotment of events is decided by the IOA. We can just propose,” he said.

Handball, judo and karate were proposed here considering an indoor facility could come up. But now that proposal has been shelved. Instead, a 250-bed sports hostel is going to be set up here, he said.

On handball, which has been shifted to Ranchi, Hashmi, a member of the IOA executive council, said the city had no indoor stadium. “We would have requested the IOA for judo and karate to be held here, but the city should have infrastructure to host events of the magnitude of National Games,” he added.

He pointed out that the steering committee found Maithan dam near Dhanbad more suitable than Dimna lake for water sports.

On why badminton was shifted from here, Hashmi blamed the state association for not taking the initiative.

Sports ministry sources said the JOA was keen to hold events in Ranchi and Dhanbad. “Jamshedpur has got a raw deal as far as the nature and level of events are concerned,” said a senior official. He added that the association was also not keen on building an indoor facility here.

While Ranchi has got the lion’s share of 22 events, Dhanbad, which seldom organises high-profile sports, got away with as many as seven events, including water sports, netball and squash.