By Our Reporter
Shillong: In line with the ‘Year of the Youth’, the Sports and Youth Affairs Department will conduct the 25th State Athletic Meet 2012 from May 23-25 at Tura.
The Meghalaya Athletic Association (MAA) will host the event with support from the Tura District Sports Association (TDSA) and Tura District Athletic Association. The Athletic Meet will witness the participation of over 600 young athletes from all over the state.
Disclosing this at a press conference here on Wednesday, Sports and Youth Affairs Minister BM Lanong said that the main aim of this meet is to identify young talents to represent the state at the national level while giving equal exposure to the rural youth.
Union Minister of State for rural development Agatha Sangma will inaugurate the three-day event which will be managed by eight committees with BM Lanong as the patron and chaired by Director of Sports FM Dopth.
The meet will see athletes competing in different race categories apart from long jump, high jump, shot put, javelin throw, discuss throw competitions for senior (U-20), junior (U-16) and junior (U-14) categories for both boys and girls.
Chief minister Dr Mukul Sangma would be the chief guest in the closing ceremony while sports minister BM Lanong would be the guest of honour.
Around 14 affiliated units from the state have come forward to play an active role in making the event a success while the three other units-Khadsawphra, Mawshynrut and Resubelpara Sports Associations are yet to confirm their participation.
“This is the first time that we are concentrating on giving more importance to the junior category. We hope to see some old records broken by new and fresh athletes,” Lanong said.
Keeping in mind the law and order situation in Garo Hills, Lanong has appealed to the militant outfits ‘to abstain from interfering in the three-day sporting event as this is a matter of uplifting local talents.’
Elaborating further, general secretary, MAA, Finely L Pariat said that estimated budget for the whole event would be less than Rs 20 lakh.
“We hope that the State Government will provide the necessary incentives to run the event successfully,” he said.
He said that the MAA has already conducted the block level and district level training programmes whereby young rural talents were picked to represent their respective blocks and districts in the state level competition to be held at Tura.
Meanwhile, the MAA general secretary informed that the selection trial for the Shillong Sports Association will be held on Saturday at 8am at the JN Stadium here.
Pariat added that since 2012 marks the celebration of the ‘Year of the Youth’, it would befitting to present the champions of each of the events with sport shoes apart from the winner’s trophy whereas the first and second runners-up will be presented with sports a vest and shorts.
Pariat also informed that the government has proposed to introduce scholarship schemes for excelling young sports talents from various disciplines.