HYDERABAD: The sportsman in chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy was in full flow on Tuesday. While he jumped into the badmintor field wielding a racket at the inauguration of the 57th senior national ball badminton championships and impressed the audience with his skills, he won the hearts of sportspersons by richly rewarding them for their performances at the national and international events.
He also vowed to make sports a must in educational institutions. At a function at LB Indoor Stadium, Kiran Kumar Reddy distributed cash awards totalling Rs 4.5 crore to 452 sportspersons from18 disciplines who have won medals till June last. The event was conducted after a gap of four years. He recollected his sporting days at school and college and gave a few tips to budding sportspersons.
Unveiling his plans for development of sports in the state, he said an allocation of Rs 2.5 crore had been set apart for building a mini stadium in every mandal and a sports stadium costing Rs 4 crore in every Assembly constituency. Identifying the need for promotion of sports right from schools, he said sports would be made a compulsory subject in schools across the state.
Minister of sports Vatti Vasanth Kumar said the services of all coaches who were on contract would be regularised with an increment of Rs 7,500. A 2 per cent sports quota will be provided in government jobs, colleges and schools.
On omission of a few names from the list of recipients of awards, he said the list did not include those who won medals after June. “Nobody will lose anything. Names have not been omitted,” he said, asking the complainants to approach the secretary of sports.
Ten sportspersons including Gagan Narang, Jwala Gutta and Saina Nehwal were awarded in the special international category and 15 including Sania Mirza in the Asian Games-2010 category. Narang, the ace shooter, was given away the highest cash award of Rs 38,32,500.