September 16, 2006	Saturday	Sha'aban 22, 1427

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LAHORE, Sept 15: As many as 1500 athletes and officials from all four provinces gathered at the Punjab Stadium to take part in the full dress-rehearsal of 2nd Inter-provincial Games to be held here at different venues from Sept 16 to 18.

From Punjab, Sindh and NWFP 380 athletes and officials took part while Balochistan had a contingent of 350.

Punjab is hosting the games for the second consecutive time.

There are 300 technical officials to supervise the games in 25 disciplines.

Women will compete in six disciplines and softball will be contested by women only.

Punjab chief minister Chaudhary Pervez Elahi will declare the games open in the opening ceremony to be held on Saturday at 8pm. The chief ministers of the other three provinces have been invited.

The competitions will be held at different venues including Iqbal Park Sports Complex, Punjab Stadium, National Sports Coaching and Training Centre, Atiq Stadium, Lahore College, University, Bagh-i-Jinnah, Mayo Garden, Railway Stadium, and Wapda Sports Complex.

The games which have been included are athletics, boxing, badminton, basketball, baseball, handball, squash, football, hockey, judo, karate, wushu, tug-of-war, kabaddi, wrestling, table tennis, swimming, weightlifting, cycling, lawn tennis,volleyball, net-ball, taekwondo, gymnastics, bodybuilding.

The women sports included are athletics, cycling, badminton, squash, softball, table tennis and volleyball.

According to the programme finalised for the opening ceremony, bugles will herald the arrival of chief guest while the formal proceedings will start with the recitation from the Holy Quran.

The organizers had included different programme in the opening ceremony including a Crowd Show, Lahore Song, march-past of the athletes with band and school children, play of national anthem, oath-taking by a prominent athlete.

Special children will sing a song followed by the entry of celebrity athletes on buggies.

The Olympic-torch will be lit at 10:10.pm

A song, theme "Rising as One" will be present at 10.20pm and at the end a spectacular Laser Animation and Fireworks show would be displayed.

Meanwhile, the torch bearing ceremony was held on Thursday. The torch was brought from Minar-i-Pakistan by 25 former prominent athletes of Punjab to the National Hockey Stadium. From there it will be taken to the Punjab Stadium on Saturday.