Sports can help eradicate extremism from society: Fawad Ch

ISLAMABAD: Minister for Information and Broadcasting Chaudhry Fawad Hussain on Sunday said sports could play a pivotal role in eradicating extremism from society.

Addressing a news conference along with Minister for Inter-Provincial Coordination Dr Fahmida Mirza and Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Youth Affairs Usman Dar in Islamabad, Fawad Chaudhry said 6,000 athletes of 15-25 years of age would participate in the launching of Kamyab Jawan Sports Drive on Monday.

“As many as 3,300 boys while 2,700 girls are participating in the games and the ratio of girls reflects that they are equal partners in sports like politics, economy and other fields,” he said.

Read more: PM Imran to inaugurate ‘Kamyab Jawan Sports Drive’ tomorrow

The minister said talent hunt at division level would help to promote sports at grassroots level.

He termed the decline of politics and democracy in our country as the reason of decline of sports and said that the Olympics performance of Pakistan was heavily criticised in the past while hockey and squash were almost eliminated.

Speaking on the occasion, Minister for Inter-Provincial Coordination Dr Fahmida Mirza said government was taking substantial steps to promote sports in the country.

She said the new sports policy would ensure appropriate regulatory mechanism.

SAPM on Youth Affairs Usman Dar in his remarks said 68 per cent population of the country comprised youth but unfortunately 94 per cent of them did not have access to sports facilities.

Read more: Govt focused to provide sports facilities to youth: PM Imran Khan

He said the government would provide youth of Pakistan with access to quality sports with coordination of provinces. He expressed hope that Sindh would cooperate with the federal government in this regard.

The special assistant said the programme would be the biggest talent hunt programme in the history of the country.