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Abhivav Bindra agrees to be India’s Goodwill Ambassador For Rio Olympics

April 29 2016
XtraTime
Abhinav Bindra agrees to be Goodwill Ambassador in Rio 2016 for India. Image Source: File Pic
Abhinav Bindra agrees to be Goodwill Ambassador in Rio 2016 for India. Image Source: File Pic

Internet Desk: After a fallout over appointment of Salman Khan as India’s Goodwill Ambassador for Rio Olympics, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on Friday wrote to Olympic gold medallist Abhinav Bindra, cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar and music maestro AR Rahman to join Salman. Out of the three so far, Bindra is the first to accept the offer.

Expressing his “gratitude” in a series of tweets, Bindra posted an image of the letter IOA sent him requesting to accept the offer. But the ace shooter, who will also be one of the competitors in India’s shooting contingent for Rio, said he will only be available for the role until July 15.

There was a huge furor over the appointment of Bollywood icon Salman, with wrestler Yogeshwar Dutt, sprint legend Milkha Singh and many others expressing their displeasure over not considering a sportsperson for the role.

The IOA then issued a clarification through their secretary Rajeev Mehta who said Salman’s role doesn’t have any monetary aspect attached to it and is only done so that his popularity can bring in more support for India at Olympics.

The secretary also said that they will be approaching celebrities from the cricket and music world in the coming days, which was followed by an offer made to Tendulkar, Rahman and Bindra.