Sanjay Singh, President of the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI), urged the Commonwealth Games Federation to retain the sport of wrestling in the 2026 edition.
However, he also admitted the current host Scotland might not keep the sport.
Wrestling was part of the CWG roster in the last three editions. The last time wrestling missed out was in 2006 when basketball replaced it. Before that, wrestling was removed from the program in 1998 for the addition of 10-pin bowling.
Scottish capital Glasgow is set to host the 2026 Commonwealth Games after Victoria pulled out, citing the huge cost of conducting the showpiece.
“I met CGF President Chris Jenkins and CGF CEO Katie Sadleir during NSFs (National Sports Federations) meeting with the Commonwealth Games Federation. We told them how important it is for India and several other nations to have wrestling on the CWG roster. They said that Scotland will have a final say,” Singh told PTI.
“Wrestling is not very popular in the UK. England and Scotland do not send many wrestlers, so chances of it being retained are not very high. They told us the roster will have only 10-11 sports and Scotland will make the final decision,” he added.
Wrestling is one of the sports where India has been extremely successful in the Commonwealth Games winning 114 medals till the 2022 edition.
India is one of the most successful wrestling nations in CWG, having won 114 medals in the sport till the 2022 edition.
The last edition in Birmingham in 2022 had 20 sports with India winning 61 medals and 12 of those medals were snared by the wrestlers.
Out of 22 gold medals that India won, wrestling had contributed six, the highest by any sport followed by table tennis (4) and boxing (3).