Address at the Inauguration of the National Games 2002

Youth and Dynamic Action

I am indeed delighted to inaugurate the 32nd National Games which is being held from 13th -22nd Dec 2002 with participation of 6500 sportspersons from all parts of our country assisted by more than 1500 officials.

What a beautiful environment and what a beautiful stadium. The stadium becomes beautiful since young people of the country has assembled here for the national games. When youth and dynamic action are combined, I am sure young sportspersons will electrify the nation by their creativity and innovation and above all by their sweat and excellent performance. I congratulate the organizers of the National Games 2002, particularly I greet Shri Chandrababu Naidu the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, and Shri Suresh Kalmadi, President of Indian Olympics Association, Shri H J Dora, President of Andhra Pradesh Olympic Association and their teams for creating such a beautiful infrastructure and environment for the national games 2002. My greetings and best wishes to all the participating teams. For all your success and the best performance, I am going to give you a beautiful poem:

I have now a dream,

Dream for action; Dream for performance,

I will sweat for excellence, thereby I will bring glory to the nation.

I am sure this short poem will enter into your mind to ignite the large potential in you to give the best performance. If you use this short poem, if you enter this short poem in your mind I am sure your potential for the best performance will get enhanced and you perform well.

When I see such a large gathering from various parts of the country, in this national event, to participate, to witness, to enjoy, to encourage and to recognize the teams and players. I have a message, which I would like to convey to you:

"If at all in human life there is any aspect that can enrich the mind and body in an integrated way it is sports and games".

Therefore, I urge the parents and teachers to encourage the children to actively participate in sports and games from childhood. Children spent 25,000 hours in their school from 1st Standard to 12th Standard. Therefore, this is the place where we have to reinforce sports and games facilities to mould and encourage the growth of excellent sportspersons.

India with its billion and more population, the time has come to generate and create players and sportspersons in every area. We have to select the best performers, train them physically and mentally from childhood. We should enlist 1000 persons every year in the sportsstream throughout the country. We have to educate and nurture them professionally to make sports grades, so that they can compete in asian games and Olympics and establish a record in every event when they grow.

It has been heartening to note that our sportspersons have been toiling hard to bring laurels for the country in various international events. Very recently our sportspersons did us proud in the Asian Games 2002, when they returned with a haul of 35 medals, 10 of them gold. The performance of the Indian contingent in the 17th Commonwealth games held in August this year at Manchester was quite historic. Our young sportspersons returned with 69 medals, India securing 4th position in these games. These achievements were basically due to their dedication, commitment and unflinching desire to excel in the international arena. I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate all our sportspersons, who despite many hurdles and obstacles have left no stone unturned to excel in their chosen sports. We are all assembled here to make this National Game truly memorable one.

A sportsperson gets evolved for superior performance in an environment where there is physical, psychological and nutritional support. We have to scientifically develop athletes and sportspersons to have maximum lung volume, muscle power, endurance and metabolic profile by intensive training from childhood. I am sure the Centre and all states will evolve the development of sports and games as an integrated effort from childhood to adulthood. The parents, teachers and the society need to provide an ambience to encourage the children to achieve the high level of performance in sports and athletics.

I wish all the sportpersons the organizers and everyone of you in making the 32nd National Games a grand success.

May God Bless you.