Kanpur takes giant leap in school’s hockey

s2h special

There were three big days this week in Kanpur. Kanpur, the fourth city after Kolkata, Chennai and Puducherry to embrace One Thousand Hockey Legs, went gaga in the first part of this week.

All the eight Kanpur schools that have completed formalities to join our program (one Thousand Hockey Legs) formally introduced hockey teams in their premises.

Kanpur volunteers Mrs and Mr. Gupta took pains to send the hockey equipments to these school premises, which are located in different parts of the city.

In all three Public Schools (English Medium of Education) and five Hindi medium schools, where hockey was not practiced in their premises, now look forward to train at least 20 boys or girls, as the case may be.

On Monday, the 14th December, Deendayal School boys assembled in their auditorium with the presence of Principal Mr. Vajpayee and physical education teacher Ramesh. The assembled boys were randomly given hockey slogan placards, where on both sides some information about hockey was written. They were asked to read them. During the brief ceremony, they were again randomly asked to explain the content of those placards.

Speaking on the occasion, volunteer Arumugam briefly explained the concept of One Thousand Hockey Legs and how it came to their home city. He also recollected the great hockey players the state of Uttar Pradesh produced from Dhyan Chand, Roop Singh, Md. Shahid down to RP Singh.

Volunteer Mrs Mithiesh Gupta interacted with the boys and motivated them to take up hockey, she also spirited them with catch slogans. The boys were happy to respond to her down to earth promptings.

Then on on the dais, both our volunteers and Principal Mr Vajpayee distributed the sticks to the selected boys.

The volunteers then moved to Khalsa Inter-college in Govindpur. It is a big campus, and it was surprising a college named of Khalsa was not having a hockey team till now. This blot is banished on Monday.

About 40 boys, despite being half-yearly exam day, waited for us to join the hockey fraternity. They were also explained about hockey using the placards.

OTHL volunteers informed them there will be matches involving all other othl teams in the city. They were excited to hear this. The announcement regarding conduct of quiz and essay competitions also met with equal enthusiasm.

Nagar Nigam Girls High School in Sarvodya Nagar was our third stop. Abot 100 girls assembled at their small auditorium. The girls were given an idea of how the Indian team played so beautifully in the recent Asia Cup. They were not aware of this Asia Cup and our silver winning performance. They were told in brief about the rise and rise of rural girls like Subhadra and Surinder in women hockey. Principal and physical education teacher took lot of interest to see the ceremony went off well. It seems this school will produce good results.

Miss Bula Ganguly, the Sports Officer, Government of Uttar Pradesh, joined for the fourth school, Siksha Niketan. It was in the evening 4 O’clock. Her speech and motivation are separately dwelt with in another article. Her gracious presence was the highlight of the program in this school.

Delhi Public School, Kalyanpur and Delhi Public School Azadnagar were in the agenda for the second day. Both are huge schools with lot many facilities for sporting lives. Kalyanpur had a sporting festival on Sunday and opened the school only today and we had a special assembly organized for us. Children of all sections of 6-9th class promptly gathered in a huge, huge auditorium. Hockey was given introduction the way it was done in the earlier schools, with interactive sessions with children. Rajesh Mishra, head PET conducted the proceedings. Students were specially requested to visit our dedicated website (http://othl.stick2hockey.com). Othl volunteers emphasized the fact that in their scheme of things both men and women teams score equal footing.

It was altogether different atmosphere in the another Delhi Public School, located within five kms from this school. It was an open air theatre where around 500 children were brought to hear about hockey. Miss Ganguly was the star attraction. That she played international hockey and also a leading official now, caught the imagination of the students. When she gave away the prizes, students both men and women, thronged to shake hands with her.

On the third day, it was the turn of Padampat Singhania Education Centre’s hugely popular JK School (English Medium). Volunteers Mrs and Mr Gupta were joined by Bula madam. The threesome were given a tradition welcome by the school principal Ms. Medha. In the presence about 300 children, our hockey equipments were handed over by the Principal to each of the newly selected hokey team members.

So, months of home works bore fruit inthe first three days of the week. With 8 schools in the active mode, beehive of hockey activities is expected in Kanpur in the coming months.

This Kanpur success also marks achievement of specific physical target of the Hockey Citizen Group, which conceived and executes the One Thousand Hockey Legs program. Details of which are reserved for later.