MUMBAI, Jan. 20 -- Can a national-level ice hockey team be picked from players skating on roller blades instead of ice skates? The Bombay High Court is weighing in, staying the selection of the ice hockey team representing Maharashtra at the Khelo India Winter Games 2026, on these very grounds. Making scathing remarks against the Directorate of Sports and Youth Affairs, Maharashtra, the court on Saturday put on hold the selection of a 19-member squad chosen for the games beginning in Ladakh on Tuesday. The bench said "the most shocking factor" was that the state's sports commissioner, Shital Teli Ugale, had ignored a request of the ad hoc committee of the Ice Hockey Association of Maharashtra to hold the trials at the state's only ice hockey facility, at the Phoenix Millenium Mall in Pune. Instead, the trials were conducted at a skating facility in Nigdi, Pune. The division bench of Justice Ravindra Ghuge and Justice Abhay Mantri was also surprised that only one of the 19 players selected had participated in an ice hockey tournament, while 20-odd national players, who have been participating in Winter Games at the national level, were ignored. Two of these 20 players have even represented India in U20 boys' events at the international level.htc...