Singapore National Olympic Council (SNOC) secretary-general Chris Chan was elected into the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) executive council on Thursday.

In his new role as the CGF's regional vice-president for Asia, Chan, 68, will work with other Asian Commonwealth Games Associations (CGA) to raise the sporting standards in the region and ensure they have opportunities to participate in the quadrennial Games.

He cited how it was hard for Asian countries to qualify for sports like netball where the likes of England, Australia and New Zealand dominate the world rankings.

While it is too late for any changes for Birmingham 2022, Chan, who will serve a four-year term, hopes to implement tweaks for subsequent Games.

He said: "I'm supposed to steer the Asian ship and take care of Asia's interests. I've met my Asian CGA counterparts and we think we've been lagging behind quite a bit so we decided that we'll be meeting more often to try to catch up."

Another area he is keen to explore is making the Games more relevant to a younger audience.

He pointed to recently launched Transformation 2022 Refresh, the second phase of the Commonwealth Sport Movement's strategic plan for 2015 to 2022 which is focused on creating a nurturing sports environment for athletes.

He said: "It's not just fighting for Asia's CGA interests, it's also about contributing to the whole movement."

Indian Olympic Association (IOA) secretary-general Rajeev Mehta was originally set to contest the Asia post with Chan but the IOA withdrew his nomination and pulled out of the CGF general assembly in Rwanda to protest against the exclusion of shooting - a sport India has traditionally done well in - at the 2022 Games.

It also withdrew its nomination of Namdev Shirgaonkar for CGF sports committee member and is threatening to boycott the Games.

CGF president Louise Martin was re-elected unopposed for a second four-year term.