The recently concluded EA International Open Bridge Championships has raised an uncomfortable question which, I felt should be brought to the attention of all bridge players. At the outset, let me hasten to clarify that this article is not about the players or their achievements. It is more an issue of consistency of actions of the Bridge Federation of India.
While it is matter of great achievement for TV Ramani to have finished third in the Open Teams Gold Event as well as fourth in the Mixed Pairs event, an uncomfortable question arose as to how he could participate in the Mixed Pairs elimination as well the play off for the 3rd / 4th place, both of which took place on the same day.
Bridge players may recall that in the run up to the event, many mixed participants were complaining that this event was letting two ranking points events clash and thereby preventing participants desirous of participating in both. One thought is that this was a solution devised on the spot by the BFI too allow the players who faced a severe clash in schedules to participate in both events. This is given strength by the fact that the BFI allowed teams which had qualified for the Swiss Teams Finals (and probably even not) to withdraw and participate in the mixed pairs event.
However, this raises another uncomfortable question. During the last Winter Bridge Nationals, another player was not permitted to participate in the Mixed Pairs eliminations as he had participated in the first few rounds of the Senior Teams event held on the previous day. He ended up not participating further in the Senior Teams event as well as not participating in the Mixed Pairs event.
What appears to be even more disturbing was the way the decision to permit participants to play in two events simultaneously was taken. In fact, we have it on good record that the recently appointed chairman of the technical committee, Mr. T C Pant, tendered his resignation in protest against this decision. We are not aware what the status on this matter is currently.
Some interesting questions were being raised as a fall out of this decision, the most interesting of which was “Would a player be eligible to play both in the Gold and Silver team events simultaneously?”, a question which was hitherto never in play.
To conclude, we would like to reiterate that this post is not a criticism of any player, or of any decision taken by the BFI. It is just looking at the past before this decision and the aftermath of the same.
Players can reflect on the same at their leisure
Disclaimer : All opinions are entirely those of the author and are no reflection of the views of the BridgeFromHome Team.