National Games closing ceremony: Adopt sports, support sportspersons, VP tells govt and firms

Panaji, Nov 9 (PTI) Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar on Thursday said governments as well as public and private sector companies must adopt and support sportspersons and that such an act will do great justice to the nation.

He was speaking at the closing ceremony of the National Games that were underway here since October 26.

"I want to ask the governments and public as well as private sector firms to adopt sports, support sportspersons. It will do the nation great justice. Today's biggest event management is of sports. It is also the biggest marketing area. Let our sportspersons get opportunities and move ahead," Dhankhar said.

Hailing the organisers for including traditional sports in the National Games, the VP said such disciplines would soon find their way into the Olympics.

"Goa has organised an Indian Olympics in terms of scale and requirement. I am leaving my heart here today. I am so much touched by Goa's climate, Goa's human resource and the talent of Goa administration," he said.

While parents used to be worried earlier if their children were playing, Dhankhar said sports had now become one of the "important avenues of display of human genius" and "also impacts geo politics, as we know names of many countries because of their sportspersons".

Speaking at the event, the VP said he still trembles thinking about the country's precarious economic situation in 1990.

"I was Lok Sabha MP in 1989. I have seen with my own eyes what a coalition government does to a country. When I was in the Union government in 1990, our gold had to be taken in physical form to be pledged to two Swiss banks to sustain our financial capacity," the VP pointed out.

While India's foreign reserves at the time were USD one or two billion, it was now USD 600 billion, the VP said, adding the country had come a long way from those distressing days.

Asserting that such turnarounds take place when the leadership is strong, Dhankhar said, "It is this leadership when our PM tells our women's hockey team, after their loss at the Tokyo Olympics, that they had done a good job and would do better ahead." "This is leadership that engages in hand holding," he added.

By 2030, India would become the world's third largest economy from the current fifth position, he asserted. PTI