Sukhbir Singh Badal, Deputy Chief Minister, Punjab today cleared the decks for holding 4th edition of World Cup Kabaddi in the second half of November 2013, in which 25 nations would vie for record prize money in a fortnight long sports extravaganza. Both boys and Girls teams from 25 countries would participate in this World Cup.Reviewing the progress of ongoing sports complexes throughout the state and giving final touches to the Sports Calendar for the year 2013-14 in a meeting held here today, Mr. Badal said that strict NADA anti doping guidelines would be implemented in the tournament and Punjab would seek more participation of countries from Europe, Africa, USA, Australia and other non representative sub-continents to give Kabaddi world class status. He said that the Government was already taking up this issue with International Olympic Committee for making efforts to include this game in 2020 Olympics besides ensuring the continuation of traditional game wrestling also.
Finalising the Sports Calendar, Mr. Badal asked Mr. Ashok Gupta, Secretary Sports to have consultation with Hockey India and International Hockey Federation to fix the itinerary of four nation hockey tournament as all the 20 stadiums including hockey stadiums would be inaugurated by this international hockey tournament.
Emphasizing the need for world-class sports infrastructure Mr. Badal said that 11 World Class Stadiums have already been completed at the cost of Rs. 96 crore and 9 more stadiums would be dedicated to the nation by December this year. He said that 8 of these stadiums have been floodlit and Sports Stadium at Ghudda and village Badal would have synthetic track costing Rs. 5 crore for each stadium. It was informed in the meeting that 11 stadiums that are set to be completed included Bathinda, Sangrur, Amritsar, Gurdaspur, Mohali, Faridkot, PAU Ludhiana, Jalandhar and Ghudda. Eight stadiums have floodlit facilities and most of the stadiums have Astroturf. The 9 stadiums that would be completed by December included Mansa, Ludhiana, Hoshiarpur, GNDU Amritsar, Hockey Stadium Bathinda, Hockey Stadium village Badal, Synthetic track at village Badal, multipurpose stadium at Jalalabad and at Fazilka. Mr. Badal said that SAD-BJP Government was laying special emphasis on Sports Infrastructure as during 2007-12, Rs. 200 Crore were spent on Sports infrastructure that included setting up 6 Astroturf stadiums, 7 Multipurpose stadiums and sports complex at Mohali. Mr. Badal said that to percolate the sports culture in the villages, the SAD-BJP Government distributed 5000 rural gyms and 9000 sports kits to village youth at the cost of Rs. 22 crore and Rs. 9.81 crore-prize money was distributed to players excelling in international events. He said that to make the sports attractive for Punjabi youth 3% Sports quota was introduced in the Government jobs and 10 eminent sports personality were given category A jobs.
Promising to inculcate Sports Culture in the state, Mr. Badal said that a record provision of Rs. 91 crore has been made in the current budget and Rs. 13 crore has been set aside for developing play grounds in 1233 villages. He said that 2200 sportspersons would be graded and would get monthly scholarship of Rs. 500 and Rs. 1000 per month. He said that Punjab Government has already finalized the plan to establish Shaheed Baba Deep Singh Center of Excellence in Sports at Mohali with 4 regional campuses at Bathinda, Jalandhar, Ludhiana and Amritsar at the cost of Rs. 100 crore, in which 2000 budding sportspersons would be selected for training.
Prominent amongst those who participated in the meeting included Mr. Ashok Gupta, Secretary Sports, Mr. Manvesh Singh Sidhu, Mr. Ajay Mahajan and Mr. Ashwani Kumar Sharma, all Special Principal Secretaries to Deputy CM, Mr. Shiv Dular Singh, Director Sports and representatives of construction companies executing sports projects.