recreation, freebies, and foreign trips abroad what is it? With heavyweights at the helm instead of professionals, it is unlikely that talent will find its rightful place. Let’s follow how it’s done in other countries that produce world-class sportsmen. Do those countries employ retired and tired bureaucrats to head their sports organisations?
At the local level, it’s heartening to observe how residents of the Model Town Society, Lahore, realise the importance of sports for youngsters. The society has provided fields for cricket, hockey, and football clubs.
However, the society’s own club of pre-Partition days has remained closed for some years now. It has hard courts for tennis, two squash courts and an Olympic size swimming pool. It fell to the vagaries of political infighting. Believably, Hamza Shahbaz Sharif, chairman Punjab Sports Board, wants to convert the club into a huge sports complex. The outrageously ambitious project, according to plans, would take Rs500 million to complete. Until the fabulous sum is raised, which itself is a million rupee question, why not reopen the club and let young talent find its place? How one wishes Hamza Shahbaz was a tennis buff!
The residents of the society deserve credit for encouraging their young boys and girls to participate in sports. To facilitate young sports enthusiasts, the Model Town Sports Club in K Block, which is different from the society’s own club, offers excellent facilities to play tennis and football. This club has four grass courts and three hard courts for tennis beside a well-equipped gym.
Pakistan’s former number one tennis player, Muhammad Khalid, coaches young boys and girls in the club. The privately-run sports facility has produced tennis players at the national level. Abid Mehood is one such person who has been representing the country at the international level. He was once a ball boy in this club and I did a piece on him in this paper.
The Punjab government could encourage such clubs by providing them electricity at cheaper rates than charging them at commercial rates. And will the federal government rid our national sports of the current VIP stranglehold on the top slots?
The writer is a freelance columnist based in Lahore.
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