Ranchi, Sept. 30: The schedule for the 34th National Games is out, but the National Games Organising Committee (NGOC)

is still waiting for lists from five national sports federations to complete accreditation formalities for participating teams. The five national sports federations — equestrian, shooting, kho-kho, table tennis and hockey — are yet to send in lists of seven eligible state teams for the Games to be held from November 21. The rest of the 28 national sports federations have sent their lists, but some have to send names of technical officials who will accompany the players. In each of the 33 events, only eight states are eligible to participate — the host state, Jharkhand automatically qualifies as the eighth team. Now, what the NGOC is waiting for is the list of seven states, which will participate in equestrian, shooting, table tennis, kho-kho and hockey. However, NGOC treasurer and member of the Games technical conduct committee M.K. Pathak said: “This should not cause any worry. Probably, the five national sports federations are waiting for their respective tournaments to end so that they can send the lists of the top seven teams.” These federations, he claimed, had taken permission for sending the list late. Till the 32nd National Games, which was held in Hyderabad in 2003, the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) rule was to permit only top eight states to take part. But from 2007 when the Games was held in Guwahati, the IOA revised the rule to permit the host state to participate as the eighth team, regardless of its performance and ranking in a given sport. This explains why Jharkhand will get to field an equestrian team even though it doesn’t have trained horses or riders. And Richa Mishra, the ace swimmer from CRPF, has agreed to represent Jharkhand. Institutional teams like the Railways or the Services do not participate in National Games. It gives the host states a chance to borrow players or teams from those institutions to boost their medal hopes, a senior JOA functionary said. NGOC has already released the Games schedule which includes dates of team arrivals, official meetings and various competitions. The Games will be wrapped up by December 4.