KARACHI: The Karachi Hockey Association (KHA) will organise an Inter-school hockey tournament in January to mark revival of national game at the grassroots level.

The KHA was thrilled to receive an enormous response from the city’s government and private educational institutions at a meeting it had convened at their Gulshan Iqbal Sports Complex the other day.

The KHA president Dr Syed Junaid Ali Shah, who chaired the three-hour meeting, welcomed the repres­entatives of 31 schools for coming forward with the sole aim to revive the game as it was in the past.

The KHA secretary former international Haider Hussain, who also attended the meeting, told Dawn that the meeting among other matters, discussed dates and timings of organising the competition besides listening to problems faced by schools in this regard.

The KHA official asked the schools to submit general registration number (GRN), copy of the student’s B form together with copy of father’s ID card, copy of admit card, to the organisers before the event to ensure transparency.

“Action will be taken against student and his school if someone found guilty,” he added.

He said the some of the schools representatives requested the KHA to provide coaches to identify talented players in raising hockey teams. “Acceeding to another request, the KHA chief assured to provide hockey gears including hockey sticks, balls, goal-keeping pads especially to the government schools.,” added the official.

Haider said KHA is focusing on the youth at the grassroots level and bent upon to raise the level in a short span of time. He said the dates and format of the competition will be announced in due course of time.

Published in Dawn December 7th, 2016