Six top hockey centres by next year

Prabhjot Singh

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 31

Punjab wants to dodge past the problem of drugs through sports. And hockey has been its top of the list sport to wean the youth away from drugs and bring them back to the playfields.

Kabaddi will follow suit and then come other sports, including football, volleyball, basketball and some individual sports.

This is the plan new Sports Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal has drawn for the state.

And his faith in sports to fight drugs has been corroborated by the response his first venture – four-nation Gold Cup Hockey – has evoked.

Missing first Olympics in 80 years has been no damper for hardcore Punjabi hockey enthusiasts for their continuous love for once national sport was evident from the way they almost filled the massive Sector 42 Hockey Stadium before the inaugural match of the double-leg four-nation Punjab Gold Cup tournament here this evening.

Interestingly, the turnout today, the first-day of the 10-day tournament, was no less than on any day of two cricket Test matches the neighbouring Mohali hosted at the PCA Stadium in the recent weeks. All indications are that sports can still turn the tables.

Hockey cannot survive without government support. From a traditional poor man’s sport, it has now become the second costliest team sport in the world today.

A synthetic pitch is a mandatory requirement for any international game of hockey.

And to lay a pitch besides a huge piece of land, a regular tube well connection with proper drain system are the supplementary requirements.

The Sector 42 Stadium, that the Punjab government chose to hold its inaugural event in absence of a single hockey stadium of international specifications sin the State, has been nothing more than a compulsive choice.

The cash-rich Chandigarh Administration uses this huge sports complex more as an administrative complex than a sporting venue.

The change rooms, umpires and judges’ rooms in the main pavilion building of the stadium are now used as offices.

It is why, the organizers had to pitch in rooms on the other side of the stadium as change rooms for the teams. Electronic scoreboards do not work.

“Next year, we will hold the matches at six different venues in Punjab,” says Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir.

The Punjab Government has some of its new sports projects cleared by the centre.

These include new ultramodern hockey stadium at Talwandi Sabo, one of Takht cities of the Sikhs, and another such complex in Taran Tarn in the Majha belt.

Incidentally, Taran Tarn is the area to which Union Minister of State for Sports Manohar Singh Gill belongs.

The GNDU hockey complex and the Surjit Singh Hockey Stadium in Jalandhar would also be upgraded and provided floodlights and facilities meeting requirements of an international tournament.

Besides, a new six-a-side synthetic surface would also be laid at Sansarpur, once hockey nursery of the country.