The Hindu : 34,000 sports kits to be distributed

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Nov 30, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Andhra Pradesh-Hyderabad

34,000 sports kits to be distributed

By V. V. Subrahmanyam

HYDERABAD Nov.29. As part of the State Government's resolve to encourage sports all over, the Department of Youth Services will soon be distributing as many as 34,000 sports kits at a cost of Rs. 12 crores in about three weeks time to various youth associations, clubs and educational institutions.

Each sports kit is to comprise of one complete cricket kit (except the mat), two volleyballs & a net, two footballs & a net, one carrom board set and a chessboard to the organisations identified by a State-level committee. It was also decided to reserve 30 per cent of them to the Government-run educational institutions.

The Director of Youth Services, G. Kamal Vardhan Rao, said the beneficiaries were identified by district-level committees chaired by the district Minister concerned and co-chaired by the district Collector.

A State level panel headed by the Sports Minister, P. Ramulu, and consisting of the Excise Minister, Tammineni Sitaram, the Information Minister, Chandramohan Reddy, Chandana Khan, secretary, Youth Advancement & Tourism, vice-chairman and managing director of the Sports Authority of Andhra Pradesh (SAAP), and the in-charge special officer of AP Sports School, K. Narsaiah, will be monitoring the programme. Mr. Vardhan Rao is the convenor of the committee.

The evaluation panel to certify the quality of the sports kits will be done by another panel headed by A.S.V. Prasad, technical advisor to State Government (Sports) and comprises of coaches drawn from each of the disciplines. Mr. Rao says that cricket was chosen in keeping with the huge demand piling up over the last 12 months. Though it was not clear if the Government would take into consideration the availability of playgrounds to the selected organisations.

Senior officials in charge of the programme remind that the programme was a promise made by the Chief Minister, N. Chandrababu Naidu, during the Vivekananda Birth Anniversary celebrations earlier this year.

Last time, the State Government had distributed 14,000 sports kits at a cost of Rs. 7crores. Following criticism that the kits were given away to the kith and kin of the `influential people', guidelines were modified to ensure the kits reach the targeted beneficiaries, officials claim.

The District Ministers concerned have been made accountable for the kits distribution unlike in the past when MLAs were given the powers. And, even the Ministers' list of beneficiaries is to be cleared by the District Committee. While the youth associations\clubs will be given a set of cricket, volleyball and carrom kits only, educational institutions will be given the complete sports kit for all the five disciplines mentioned.

The break-up of procurement of the kits is as follows: cricket kits: 34,000, carom:17,000, volleyball:17,000, football:10,000 and chess:10,000 boards and pieces.

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