LAHORE, June 10: With the completion of Wapda Sports Complex, the citizens of Lahore will have a much-needed sports infrastructure. Lahore, also the Punjab capital having a population of around 65 million, was a neglected city as far as the sports infrastructure for the games other than cricket and hockey was concerned.

The city has the distinction of having the world’s largest National Hockey Stadium and the beautiful Gaddafi Stadium for cricket. But no facility of international standard for other sports like boxing, volleyball, gymnastics, athletics, karate, wrestling, basketball, and table tennis was available.

Iqbal Park Sports Complex in the Walled City area is the only other sports venue. But it had been rejected by the sports organizers due to technical flaws in its indoor gymnasium and the congested traffic. No main events are being held there for quite sometime.

The construction work on the complex, situated at Kot Lakhpat adjacent to the grid station, started in 1987. The work stopped twice before its speed beefed up in 1999. The work on the first phase was completed in 2002.

In the first phase, an indoor gymnasium having a seating capacity of 5,000, a cricket ground also usable for athletics and football events with a main enclosure and a hostel of 18 rooms to provide lodging facilities to 72 players and officials were completed.

Spanning over 37,000 square metres of area, the first phase was completed with an estimated cost of Rs400 million.

Soon after its completion, the complex got attracted the organizers of the sports. The Pakistan Athletics Federation and Pakistan Boxing Federation had organized their national championships at the Wapda Sports Complex this year. Besides, the table tennis matches between Pakistan and China had also been held here.

Wapda Sports Control Board secretary Khalid Mahmood said the tenders had been invited to complete the second phase of the stadium. After the completion of the second phase by the end of this year, the complex would be ready to host any international event, he claimed.

Mr Khalid said that a swimming pool with a cost of Rs35 million, floodlights at the main ground with an expenditure of Rs10 million and buying of equipment of almost all games with an estimated cost of Rs5 million were included in the second phase.

The Wapda, after having its own complex, has now equipped with all the ingredients to offer strong challenge to the decades long supremacy of Army in the National Games.

The secretary said that Wapda chairman Lt-Gen (retired) Zulifqar Ali Khan showed keen interest in the project.