PANAJI
Close on the heels of the passing away of Goa's first Santosh Trophy captain Menino Figuereido, Goa's sports fraternity lost another prominent personality in Roque Dias, a former State badminton player and high-ranking sports administrator.
Dias passed away on Sunday at a private hospital and had been ailing for some time after suffering a stroke. He had recently retired from service at the Sports Authority of India, where he had risen to be the Executive Director. Dias had also done a stint as Director of Sports and Youth Affairs in Goa in the 1990s when he was serving on deputation.
He had a brief playing career and represented Goa at badminton nationals from 1975 to 1982 before entering the complex field of sports administration where he became director of the National Institute of Sports (NIS), Patiala and also the regional head of SAI’s western region, headquartered at Gandhinagar, Gujarat.
In the Delhi CWG, 2010, Dias was named Deputy Director General for the import of equipment and was among the handful of officers who emerged unscathed in the many corruption-related probes into the controversial Games.
Dias' contribution to developing sports infrastructure including laying of synthetic surfaces, import of equipment and his involvement in the preparation of Indian teams in various disciplines is also well documented. He represented India at the Melbourne CWG and was assigned the task to study administration and organisational inputs to be put into practice at the Delhi CWG.
Dias was the first Goan to be awarded the 'national youth award' which he received from the hands of the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. More recently, he was instrumental in the conduct of the FIFA U-17 World Cup, of which he was the Project Director.
He was also involved in the team which came up with the 'Sports Code' and also designed the module for introducing the use of yoga in sports training of top Indian athletes, many of who have attributed it as one of the factors which contributed to improved medal tallies of the country in international meets.
