Abid, a youngster from the downtown area of Srinagar, travels almost 20 kilometres every Sunday morning to reach Shalbugh in central Kashmir’s Ganderbal district where vacant land is available for enthusiastic cricketers like him, which caters the rush of over 500 players at a time.
The vacant government land has not been developed for sports, but many youngsters, due to the lack of sports fields, turn to the field every Sunday to play cricket. Having more than 30 undeveloped turfs, the youngsters from Srinagar, Budgam and Ganderbal feel free to visit the place at any moment to play cricket. “In the congested downtown areas, there are hardly a few playgrounds, which don’t accommodate the huge rush of the cricketers, especially on Sundays. Dozens of cricket teams from Srinagar reach Shalbugh every Sunday to play cricket as the huge chunk of government land is available there for them to flourish their talent, and skills in the field of sports,” said Abid, who is in his 30s.
He added that for the past 20 years, he has been playing cricket, but the fact is that for the first time, the youngsters are getting a chance to play at the dream levels. “There is no dearth of talent in any manner, but what lacked previously was the favour towards the sportsmen and the measures towards augmenting the infrastructure,” he added.
Abid said that the dearth of playfields is the outcome of the non-seriousness of the previous governments here, which is taking a heavy toll on the youngsters at present. “Presently, the youth are getting very much attracted towards the sports, especially cricket, but the situation has worsened on the ground as the number of playfields is less when it comes to accommodating the rush of sports enthusiasts, especially in Srinagar,” he said.
“It is good to see the youngsters showing reluctance towards drug menace and indulging themselves in sports, but the lack of sports fields need to be increased at the same time to tackle the rush of the sportsmen,” he said, adding that it is the love and passion towards the cricket that cricketers like him travel nearly 20 kilometres every Sunday to keep themselves intact with the sports.
“Luckily, we have found the spot where we can flourish our talent and can make ourselves able to compete with the youth from outside Jammu and Kashmir,” he said.
However, he added that a couple of turfs maintained by the local youth are purely meant for the tournaments at the ground, where frequent tourneys are being organized to boost the morale of the youngsters.
“Within the boundaries, there is no disturbance at all as no one is being allowed to play within the limits, thus becoming more attractive among the youth as playing on the maintained turfs gives an impression of high-quality cricket at the ground.
The sports infrastructure has undoubtedly increased to a large extent in Jammu and Kashmir, especially in the last couple of years, but what needs to be done is to increase the number of sports grounds for the youth so that the motive behind indulging youth in the sports field is ensured on the ground.
Pertinently, Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha had stressed for development of playfields in every block of Jammu and Kashmir.
Sinha had taken serious note of poor sports infrastructure that was creating hurdles in the performance of players as Jammu and Kashmir had only 137 playfields against the requirement of 2500. (ANI)
