Target 100% involvement of adult population in Sports and Cultural events: Dr. Arun Kumar Mehta

Srinagar : Chief Secretary, Dr Arun Kumar Mehta today impressed upon the officers of the Sports and Culture Department to give opportunity to each person to either take part in sporting or other cultural activities for giving their creative energies a chance and improve quality of their lives.
He made these remarks while presiding over the meeting to take stock of the preparations made for rolling out of LG’s Sports and Cultural Rolling Trophies for the employees of J&K. The meeting was attended by Principal Secretary, Finance; Commissioner Secretary, GAD; Secretary, Tourism & Culture; Secretary, Youth Services & Sports; Director, YS&S besides other concerned officers of these Departments.
Dr Mehta emphasised on participation of 100% population in such creative activities for giving each of them an opportunity to showcase their talent and chisel it further. He noted that everyone deserves to be happy and healthy in their lives and sports, art and culture are the sure ways of bringing both of these lifestyle changes simultaneously.
He urged them to involve people in as many sporting and art activities as possible. He asked for giving opportunities to both men and women right from the Panchayat level by involving them in the arenas of their choice including traditional art and sports activities. He advised them to conduct competitions in cuisine making, wicker work, papermachie, woodwork, pottery, Bandpather, tug-of-war, Wrestling, and other relevant activities for the people of the local area.
He made out that before 2019 the participation of people in sports across the UT was bare minimum as the activities were restricted to few urban pockets only. He said that today the number has crossed to more than 65 lakh in the UT for the reasons of due focus on creation of requisite infrastructure and holding of sports competitions in each village.
The Chief Secretary stated that by giving same impetus to the cultural activities right from the Panchayat level the times are not far when its participation would go up on similar lines. He told them to be innovative in involvement of people.
He said that by channelizing the energy of youth in these activities they could be saved from becoming prey of drug addiction, thereby helping in creation of ‘Nasha Mukt’ J&K. While reviewing the rolling out of LG’s Sports and Cultural Rolling Trophies the Chief Secretary stressed on including more activities of art to give opportunities to more employees.
He said that even employees need some opportunities to loosen up from their daily schedules. He asked them to even consider having a competition between Employees winning team and LG trophy winner from civil side.
On the occasion the Secretary, Culture, Syed Abid Rasheed Shah informed the meeting that the Department is going to organize cultural activities in art forms like singing, painting, debating, poetry, essay writing and story telling. He further informed that in each competition, the participation at District, HoD, Divisional and Administrative Department level shall be ensured.
The trophy would be given to the best administrative department and kept by it till next competition. He also gave out that cash awards to best performers would be given in each competition.
As far as the LG’s Sports Roller Trophy is concerned the Secretary, Youth Services & Sports, Sarmad Hafeez informed the meeting that the competitions in 6 sporting activities of Cricket, Football, Volleyball, Table tennis and Hockey would be held at both Jammu and Srinagar. He further informed that 552 matches involving more than 1600 employees would be organised over a period of 100 days.
It was also given out that session on Yoga and mental health are also part of this trophy. The venues, manpower and budget required for holding of this sports competition was also discussed besides taking note of the paraphernalia and other gear that would be made available to the players participating in the tournament.