Foundation stone of Adampur airport soon, says Sukhbir

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, November 10

Addressing the gathering during matches of Dr BR Ambedkar Sixth World Cup Kabaddi 2016, Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Badal announced that an international airport at Adampur would be constructed soon.

He said that process of land acquisition for the airport was under process and within next few weeks, the foundation stone of this project would be laid and in one and a half years, the international airport would be operational. He said the airport would prove very beneficial to people of Punjab.

He said the Punjab Government had started organising the World Cup Kabaddi around seven years ago. He said they had made kabaddi an international sport, in which countries such as Sierra Leone, Argentina, Kenya, Sri Lanka, New Zealand, Tanzania and many others, which had never even heard of kabaddi, were now competing in the sport.

The state government had sent coaches to different countries, where they had trained kabaddi teams, which were now competing in the present edition of World Cup Kabaddi.

Badal said the government had set up the Punjab Institute of Sports (PIS) at Mohali, which had all modern coaching facilities and was one of its kind institute in the country where more than 5,000 sportspersons were being trained by expert coaches.

In the matches on the eighth day, a total of three matches were held in Sports Stadium, Adampur. In today’s matches, the USA and Australia in men’s section, while New Zealand in women’s section registered victories over their opponents.

A large number of spectators had gathered at Adampur, which had hosted the World Cup Kabaddi matches for the first time. In matches in the men’s section, the USA defeated Tanzania by 55-36 and Australia defeated Argentina by 58-43. While in the women’s section, New Zealand defeated Sierra Leone 47-17.

MLAs Pawan Kumar Tinu, Sarwan Singh Phillaur, Gurpatrap Singh Wadala, Mohinder Kaur Josh, director sports Punjab Rahul Gupta, assistant director Sports Department Kartar Singh Sehamby, and district sports officer Amrik Singh were also present on the occasion.

Punjabi singers Sunanda Sharma and Kulwinder Billa enthralled the audience with their performances.

Not allowed to meet Dy CM: SGPC member

An SGPC member from Adampur, Davinder Kaur Kalra, today alleged that she was not allowed to meet Deputy CM Sukhbir Badal during his visit to the World Kabaddi Cup tournament today.

She said she was sitting at the stage set up at the venue along with other Akali leaders and SGPC members when Sukhbir Badal arrived. “Sukhbir went to meet the kabaddi players near the ring and everyone got down the stage to meet him. The moment I got up, the women’s police came around me and stopped me from going ahead. When I asked them the reason, they said they were doing so as per the directions of their seniors,” she said.

Kalra and Adampur MLA Pawan Tinu have not been going along well. A furious Kalra said, “When other SGPC members sitting at the venue, including Paramjit Singh Raipur, Kulwant Singh Manan and Ranjit Singh Kahlon, could go and meet him, she did not understand the reason for being prevented from going ahead to meet the Deputy CM.”