Dilip Tirkey says he was not consulted on Hockey India's saffron jersey decision

Hockey India president Dilip Tirkey has stated he was not consulted before the body approved a saffron jersey, characterising the matter in an internal message. "Without being placed before the Executive Board for discussion and without my prior knowledge," says President Dilip Tirkey in an internal email.

Tirkey, who leads Hockey India, made the remark in an email that was cited in reports published on 2026-07-31. The comment identifies the Executive Board as the forum where such decisions ought to be discussed and highlights that he had not been informed beforehand. The message was described as internal in the coverage of the matter.

The core of Tirkey’s statement is procedural: he indicates the saffron jersey decision did not come before the Executive Board. He framed his objection around the absence of prior notice to him personally. The wording of the email focuses on the steps that, in his view, were skipped in reaching the decision.

The reference to the Executive Board appears central to Tirkey’s account of events, and he emphasised lack of prior knowledge in the same passage. The brief nature of the cited remark concentrates on those two points rather than on any detail of the jersey itself. The internal email, as reported, limited its content to that procedural contention.

Hockey India’s leadership structure and the role of its Executive Board are invoked in the email as the appropriate channel for such discussions. Tirkey’s wording draws a distinction between decisions that are taken within that governance framework and actions that, he says, occurred outside it. The report containing the email did not, in the cited excerpt, include further explanation or additional comment from other officials.

The published account leaves the sequence of events surrounding the saffron jersey decision described primarily through Tirkey’s one-line objection. "Without being placed before the Executive Board for discussion and without my prior knowledge," says President Dilip Tirkey in an internal email. The remark underscores his assertion that he had not been consulted.

The matter, as reported on 2026-07-31, centres on the procedural complaint made by the Hockey India president. The internal email quoted in coverage supplies the organisation’s chief executive’s view of how the decision was handled and signals a governance dispute over the process used.