Excelsior Sports Correspondent
JAMMU, Nov 10: Sports extravaganza Sportathon 2016 concluded at KC Sports Club with an impressive award presentation ceremony inside the spacious indoor Cricket Hall of the Club, here today.
Dr. Nirmal Singh, Deputy Chief Minister graced the occasion as the chief guest, while Raju Chowdhary, Chairman of KC Educational Society; Ranjeet Kalra, Member BCCI; Rajesh Gill, Chief Prosecuting Officer JKP and Rajesh Dhar, Chairman Media Committee JKCA were the guests of honour on the occasion.
On the basis of collective performance of schools and clubs in the fortnight long multi-sporting tournament, KC Public School emerged champions of sportathon 2016.
The chief guest gave away trophies and other awards to the winners in various sports disciplines. Speaking on the occasion, the Deputy Chief Minister lavished praise on Arjun Chowdhary, Managing Director of the Club for taking an initiative of creating a world-class indoor and outdoor sports complex in Jammu and giving youth of the State a chance to channelize their energies into a positive direction.
He pointed out that this initiative has countered the menace of drugs rampant among the youth very effectively and helped them not to derail from the mainstream.
The Deputy Chief Minister said the sports is essential for overall development of the human persona and the State Government has initiated several steps for the upgradation of the sports infra besides holding national and international sports events in JK.
Dr Singh said the sports activities are an important part of the extracurricular activities and these imbibe in the sportspersons the spirit of competition as well as camaraderie.
The Deputy Chief Minister said the Government has already initiated several flagship programmes in the sports sector which would be augmenting the existing infra besides adding the new ones.
It is pertinent to mention here that Sportathon launched this year by the Club is an annual mega sporting event offering the youth of J&K an ideal platform to display their skills in different sports such as indoor and outdoor Cricket, Football, Table Tennis, Swimming, Skating, Lawn Tennis and Volleyball.
“About 2000 youngsters from various CBSE and State Board affiliated schools of Jammu and various sports clubs took part in the inaugural edition of this major event,” said Arjun.
Dr. Ram Thakur, Academic Director of KCPS, thanked the Chief Guest for sparing his valuable time and blessing the young sportspersons of J&K with his presence among them.