CHITRAL (by Gul Hamaad Farooqi) : After a long hiatus, Deputy Commissioner Inter Clubs festival was held in Lower Chitral, which was organized by District Sports Officer Amir Zaman. This type of indoor sports tournament took place a long time later. According to details, a three-day Deputy Commissioner Inter-Clubs tournament was held in Lower Chitral. Ten volleyball teams, sixteen badminton teams, sixteen table tennis teams and twenty table tennis singles teams participated in this indoor tournament. Deputy Commissioner Anwar-ul-Haq was chief guest on concluding ceremony who distributed prizes among the players. Deputy Commissioner Chitral said that the district administration tries best to provide all possible facilities to the players of Chitral as per direction of the provincial and federal government. He said that five percent budget has been earmarked for regular sports in the district budget.
District Sports Officer Amir Zaman said that sports are essential for the physical and mental fitness of the youth. He said that a person cannot be mentally healthy unless he is physically fit and sports is very important for staying healthy. "As soon as I took charge, I immediately organized this indoor tournament for which the youth had been waiting for a long time," he said. "Our aim is to keep the young generation engaged in positive activities like sports and prevent them from cursing drugs and other negative activities," he added.
The players who took part in the tournament also thanked the District Sports Officer for arranging the games which had been stalled for a long time. However, the players also demanded that there is no public stadium for them in Chitral yet where they can play.
The tournament was played in an old building of warehouse of Food department as there is no special stadium for indoor sports. The youngest player in this tournament also came from Swat who is only seven years old and has been playing badminton for the last one year. Wadana used to play badminton when she was six years old. She stressed on other children that they Should also participate in sports so that he is physically and mentally healthy and refreshed.
Shields were also presented to the Deputy Commissioner, Additional Deputy Commissioner, Senior Civil Judge, Sports Officer, Population Officer, Land Settlement Officer, High School Principal, SP Investigation Muhammad Khalid and others at the end of the ceremony. Drosh team won the final trophy in volleyball. They were also given a cash prize of Rs 10000 Hindukush Hostel team was declared runner up who were given 7000 cash prize.. The badminton final trophy went to Zargaranda team who was given a cash prize of Rs 7,000 while the runner-up team was given a prize of Rs 5,000. Irfan Ahmed and Hazrat Hussain of Runner Up Team were awarded Rs 5000. Similarly, in table tennis singles, winner Naveed Ahmed was awarded Rs 5,000 with trophy and runner-up Mujtaba Shah was awarded cash prize of Rs 3,000.
The players thanked the sports department and demanded that a proper stadium be arranged for them so that they too could play in it properly and participate in sports at national and international level. A large number of spectators were present there to watch this tournament.