Massive thrust on creation of new sports infra: Ansari

*Asks for creation of new spaces for water sports activities

Excelsior Sports Correspondent

JAMMU, Nov 21: Minister for Information Technology, Technical Education and Youth Services and Sports, Imran Raza Ansari today said that the Government is keen to upgrade the sports infrastructure and massive thrust has been given to provide all necessary training and sports infrastructure to the aspirants in the state.
The Minister said this while reviewing the sports infrastructure in the state and measures being taken by the department to further upgrade it on modern lines during a meeting convened, here today.
Minister of State for Transport (Independent charge), Revenue, Public Works (Roads & Buildings), Rural Develop-ment & Panchayati Raj, Agriculture Production, YSS Sunil Kumar Sharma was also present in the meeting.
Commissioner / Secretary, Youth Services & Sports Hilal Ahmad Parray, Director Youth Services and Sports, Sheikh Fayaz Ahmad, Secretary Sports Council, Waheed-ur-Rehman Parra and all district sports officers among others attended the meeting.
The meeting was informed that projects worth Rs 4 crore and DPR’s which include the construction of new youth hostels in the State are ready with the department and soon will be sent to GOI for approval.
Further it was informed that the department is committed in engaging the youth with sports related activities and recently 55 thousand sports aspirants have registered online for “Let’s Play Football” tournament which is a big breakthrough for the department.
For the creation of infrastructure for promotion and development of water sports activities, the Minister directed officers to open new spaces in the state for water sports and asked concerned to make DPR for the same.
The Minister exhorted upon the officers to introduce Bio-metric attendance in the district offices besides, the all infrastructure should be connected with IP cameras, he added.
The Minister while lauding the efforts of the department said that there is lot more needs to be done to get the youth connected with sports activities for their overall development. He called upon the concerned officers to put in sincere efforts in providing all possible support to the aspiring sportspersons so that they can excel in their concerned sports field.
While taking stock of the illumination process of the stadiums, the Minister was apprised that progress on installation of lights at various stadiums is going on and shall be completed in a near future.
Ansari also directed the concerned officers to expedite the implementation for recruitment process of the Rehbar-e- Khel posts and asked to conclude the process in one-month deadline.
Speaking on the occasion, Sunil Sharma said that DPC of Youth services employees should be held for the early redress of stagnated promotion cases and government is committed for the welfare and betterment of the employees.
He directed the district officers to involve every constituency in sports activities on block level so that youth in general and sports aspirants in particular get the benefits being provided by the sports department and such activities will channelize their hidden potential in a constructive way.