Provincial Minister for Sports and Youth Affairs, Jahangir Khanzada has said that healthy youth are a guarantee to bright future of the nation and safe national economy. He said that Punjab government is patronizing private and public sector institutions for physical and mental fitness of a sect of more than half of its population. He said that promotion of physical activities along with education for curbing negative attitude and promoting healthy approach among the young generation are top priority of provincial government. He said that Punjab Chief Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif has recently increased one billion rupees in Punjab Sports Endowment Fund which will be spent for increasing sports fields, cricket grounds, provision of missing facilities of sports in educational institutions, establishment of sports academies and holding talent hunt programme at district and provincial level. 2017 will be the year of sports, he added.
He expressed these views while addressing sports day ceremony under the aegis of a private university at WAPDA Sports Complex. The Minister informed that talent hunt programme is being launched launched from April and in order to ensure maximum participation of the youth, best players will be selected from union council level and competitions will be held between districts and divisions. He said that players will be selected on merit basis. He said that selection boards will comprise experienced coaches and players. He said that in order to ensure the participation of the players, winning at provincial level, in national and international competitions, they will be provided opportunities of training from international coaches in sports academies. Minister for Sports informed that Punjab government is providing special business and free technical training opportunities along with educational scholarships to the youth for eliminating unemployment from the province.
The Minister strongly condemned the incident of terrorism occurred one day ago and expressed the hope that future of Pakistan will be better than today’s Pakistan as coming generations will be aware of importance of peace and power of knowledge. In the end, Jahangir Khanzada congratulated the University Administration on holding successful sports day and distributed prizes among the students winning different competitions.