Want to bring youth towards sporting activities, says Malik
Qaiser Dar
Kashmir 21 October (KNB): With an objective to boost the sporting activities in the Doru Shahabad town of Anantnag district, Shahabad Development Forum had organised a T-20 cricket tournament called Shahabad Premier League.
Earlier Suresh Raina had visited the Doru Cricket ground, which was one of the three venues for the matches of the T-20 tournament. He expressed his love and support for the youth indulging in sports activities.
“It gives me immense pleasure to see such enthusiasm & the love for sports they have,” Raina said on a facebook post sharing the pictures of his visit.
While talking to KNB, Chairman of Shahabad Development Forum Zahoor Ahmad Malik said, “Doru is a far fledged area of the district, a Chief Minister of Kashmir from 1971-1976, Syed Mir Qasim was form here as well some ministers but this area was getting neglected from past 10-15 years.”
He said that the youth of the area was indulging in drugs and other immoral things, so our primary aim to organize this tournament was to get them involved and open up the doors towards sporting activates for them.
He said that sports activities are a part of Doru’s history, during 1950-60 there were only few places where sports was a known physical activity in Kashmir and Doru was one of them.
He said,“ I started this tournament in order to revive that deep rooted history of the area and we have had a great response from the government as well as the people”.
All that we (Shahabad Development Forum) have done was in our own capacity, there was no fee or any other charges for participating teams and audiences involved in the process of registration and other formalities.
Malik said, “In-fact during Suresh Raina’s visit, he showed interest in linking the stadium with his sports academy”.
The Final match of the T-20 tournament was played between ECC and YCC on Monday at Doru sports stadium in which ECC (Eid’gah Cricket Club) lifted the trophy.
The chief guests of the event were Deputy Commissioner Anantnag Kuldeep Krishan Singh, SSP Anantnag Sandeep Choudhry, International Cricketer Parvez Rasool and Chairman of Shahabad Development Forum Zahoor Ahmad Malik.
16 teams had participated in the tournament and the other two venues for the tournament were Polo ground Srinagar and Sports Stadium Mattan. (KNB)