MARGAO
The technical delegates and director of competitions for the 37th National Games scheduled to be held in Goa later this year, arrived in the State to oversee the Games preparations.
On April 8 and 9, the delegation inspected the venues and oversaw preparations in view of the State's readiness to host the Games. The Sports Authority of Goa officials have pulled their socks up and are working late hours in view of Goa’s preparedness to host the 37th edition of the National Games.
A three-day programme is being carried out under the guidance of Secretary Sports, Swetica Sachan (IAS), Executive Director & Joint CEO Dr Geeta Nagvenkar (GCS), and IOA GTCC Chairman Amitabh Sharma. Dr Sandeep Martin Warlikar (Nodal Officer from Sports Minister's Office) coordinated the entire visit with SAG Technical Section and National Games Cell, along with Navin Acharya (Nodal Officer, SAG) and Dr Vivek Pawar (Nodal Officer, DSYA). Sandeep Heble and Rajendra Godinho (Nodal Officers, GOA) have been accompanying the technical teams during the visits.
The delegation inspected the venues for yachting at Hawaii beach, hockey at Peddem Stadium, and golf at Lalit Hotel, Canacona. While venues for yachting and hockey have been finalised, the reports on golf are awaited. Multiple venues were also inspected for rowing, canoeing, and kayaking such as Old Goa Jetty, Chapora river, and Borim river, and the technical team designated by the national federations will finalise the ideal venue suited to host these sports disciplines.
During the inspections, a few areas of concern were identified that require attention and compliance. The SAG Technical Team assured that they will take necessary actions to comply with the identified areas of concern.
Siddharth Satardekar (yachting), Vikram Singh (hockey), Ismail Baig and Col CP Singh Deo (rowing), Bilquis Mir (slalom), Ramakrishna Pulli (sprint in canoeing & kayaking) and Tushar Malhotra (golf) represented the federations. Rainer Dias and Katya Coelho (yachting), Farrel Furtado and Benny Viegas (hockey), Deepak Mandrekar and Hemang Doshi (canoeing and kayaking) were among those who accompanied the delegation on behalf of the State sports associations during the visit.
Later, there were venue inspections in athletics at Bambolim and Peddem and modern pentathlon at multiple venues. While BE Stanley Jones represented the athletics federation, Vittal Shirgaonkar represented the modern pentathlon federation.
After the inspection visits, the technical delegates and director of competitions expressed their satisfaction with the preparations made by Goa.
