By Heather Phanwar
Touchline NE, an organisation aimed towards development of Sports and Sports culture, first started as a humble idea shared between Arki Nongrum and Andy Lyngdoh during their college days. Now the two youths, who are in their thirties, have brought forth an evolution in Sports and Sporting activities in the region.
Having their humble beginnings with the first ‘Young Dribblers Grassroots Football Camp’ in 2015, they had only 5 coaches and 5 volunteers. But the program saw over 150 children enrolling. Its success pushed them to plan and organise the ‘Young Dribblers Football Winter Camp’ that got children out to play during winter holidays. “The winter camp held in Shillong Public School ground and St. Edmunds School ground got an awesome feedback from parents. They suggested we started an Annual Program”, says Nongrum with a smile.
And the Annual Program did materialise as St. Edmunds School became the first to induct it. After that, Touchline collaborated with Shillong Public School for an Open Venue.
Touchline NE in 2015 organised the first ‘3v3 Basketball Challenge and Sports Carnival’ at Madan Iewrynghep. The initiative was to bring about a new recreational event for people primarily focused on promoting Sports Culture. The event, being an instant hit, paved way for 2nd edition of the 3v3 Challenge and Sports Carnival in 2016 which had teams representing the Khasi Hills, Jaintia Hills, Garo Hills and also from Assam, Mizoram and Nagaland. “We had hundreds of spectators enjoying the 2 days tournament. They also loved the sports challenges and games”, says Lyngdoh.
But these events were not easy as the organisation had to train coaches on etiquettes from manner of speaking to inculcating Touchline Concept called Touchline Coaching Systems, which stressed on DIRT or Discipline Integrity Responsibility and Teamwork.
Nongrum and Lyngdoh believe people of the Northeast are blessed with athletic abilities, and desire to promote this aspect in a structured and systematic way. The region’s love for sports culture is immense. The organisation, witnessing the lack of sports development programmes at grassroots level and lack of sports events, wants to bring forth a change.
“We want to promote balance between sports and education. We strongly believe in the symbiotic relationship between physical development and mental development”, says Nongrum.
The organisation now has coaches, managers and interns who have developed a good relationship with stakeholders, schools and parents. “The community in general believe in us. This encourages us to work harder. We want to give them the best sports programs,” says Lyngdoh.
The objective to guide youths in honing their talents has led Nongrum and Lyngdoh to partner with Athletes Today Sports Management, a sports organisation based in Mumbai. With this partnership, the two organisations aim to help provide opportunities to talents available in the state and region.
There are also other sports in the pipeline for Touchline NE. “Self Defence program, badminton and swimming are our plans in the time to come,” says Nongrum.
When asked what their long time visions are, Lyngdoh says, “We want to be the most trusted sports organisation in the region to bring about evolution in sports overall through Sports Schools, Sports Events etc”.
With approximately 200 children enrolled in their annual programs spread across 3 venues and 2 Sports, the organisation is also on the lookout to expand to more venues. From a small start of 5 coaches, it now has a dedicated team of about 20 people – Technical and Management.
Nongrum and Lyngdoh see sports as a means to teach kids life values and career building skills like discipline, leadership, team work, confidence, creativity, etc.
When asked on whether they get any assistance from the government for conducting programmes, Nongrum says, “We are a self-sustaining venture. We want to develop and perfect our services and products first. We have not asked for any yet”.
With its motto “All About Sports”, the organisation desires to promote total benefits of sports.
“We’ll be organising the Northeast 3v3 Challenge and Sports Carnival 2017 soon. And we are pushing for few other projects in 2018,” says Lyngdoh.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtbX6w4xbxU