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July 25, 2006
Event report of Sports festival
The 14th All Pakistan Sports Festival for Special Persons 2006 is the festival for the disabled persons of Pakistan. The Milestone Society for the Special Persons is the largest and well reputed organization working for the disabled persons and organized this event in collaboration with the district sports office Abbottabad and NWFP sports. The Milestone Society for the Special Persons has been working on Independent Living for the earthquake victims in general and spinal cord injury patients in the different hospitals of Islamabad for the last eight months. So in view of the present healthy condition of these victims the Milestone decided to make these victims participate in the sport games so that they can also enjoy such healthy activities with full confidence and zest, Mercy Corps was kind enough to provide the transportation facilities for these earthquake victims and made this dream reality. So the sports event became a unique event in a sense that the earthquake victims participated in these games and won prize as well. The Milestone Society for the Special Persons is highly thankful and appreciates the other organizations which helped the society to make this event happen, The Sight Savers International, Handicap International, Mercy Corps, HOAP and Qarshi organizations donated generously to facilitate this event. The Milestone made repeated visits of Abbottabad city and arranged several meetings with District Sports Officer Mr. Tariq Mehmood so that the event is managed well and no mismanagement takes place.
The dates of the sports were decided 4th to 6th July, the Milestone members reached Abbottabad on 1st July so that they can arrange the accommodation and other facilities for the players they had to reach on 3rd July evening. On 3rd July more than 500 participants reached Abbottabad from all over the Pakistan. Their accommodation was provided in the PIPS (Pakistan International Public School) as before. The whole school was colored with banners and lights and the atmosphere was quite energetic and healthy. All teams were filled with ambition and excitements for the sports. The night of 3rd July was passed in greetings, all the organizations were greeting each other, sharing their whole year waiting, how they missed this event, its worth mentioning here that the Abbottabad sports event has its spell for the disabled persons of Pakistan, They wait whole year for this event because the lack such opportunities, where they can get together to share their ideas and work. So this event provides them a healthy opportunity where they collect memories to remember for one year. At midnight after sharing their excitement and kidding each other, the sleep captured them and all the players started going to their rooms to sleep as they had to reach to stadium for sports opening ceremony. On 4th July the opening of the sports event took place in the stadium of Blouch Regiment. The Chief Guest Mr. Kamil Ali Agha, Federal Minister, Chief Organizer Mr. Nisar Tanoli S.P Abbottabd, Mr. Tariq Mehmood District Sports Officer graced the occasion. The chief guest declared the sports event open and the sports event was started. The Sports consisted of different games including Wheelchair Race, Wheelchair Cricket, Table Tennis, Javelin, Disc Throw, Badminton, Brace Race, Crutches Race, Body Building, Power Lifting, M.R Race, Blind Race, Blind Cricket and the special events were the Wheelchair race of the Earthquake Victims and Wheelchair Cricket of the Earthquake Victims. The Handicap International donated 350 T-Shirts for all the participants and distributed among the participants by the Milestone Society and they looked united and uniformed in the ground. We are very thankful to the Handicap International for this favor. All the players played with full zest and excitement. The stadium was full of winning slogans. All the players were exhausted till the evening fall. The next day of 5th July was sponsored by the Sight Savers. They helped out the event a lot with their precious time and collaboration. The day started with the excited games of Wheelchair Cricket of the earthquake victims and the Wheelchair Race of the earthquake victims and spinal cord injured girls that participated from NIHd Islamabad. Their excitement knew no bounds, they were feeling quite relax and enthusiastic because they never thought that they will able to enjoy their life in this way again after getting spinal injury, but they were very thankful to the milestone society for giving them Independent Living Training and providing them with such a healthy and excited opportunity. The Wheelchair Race was won by The NIHd Team and the Wheelchair Cricket Match was won by Chandelle organization. The day was hub of activities and different games were in process and heading towards their conclusion with pertinent commentary by Mr. Asif Zaigham, The Sports In charge, The Army Band colored the occasion with National Anthem full of passion and unity. Another day ended with lot of playing memories but it’s not the end of ceremony because Welcome Dinner by the Light Savers was waiting for the participants in the PIPS School with sweet musical, melodious night, we are thankful to the Light Savers for their cooperation for this noble cause. The 400 participants enjoyed the Welcome Dinner in PIPS School with musical band playing songs in regional languages representing all the colors of Pakistan. The music was irresistible for the youth and there started Party Night and the dance became the order of the time.
The different regional dances including Bhangra, Khattak dance charmed the sight and won the soul. It was really a memorable and sweet night for all the participants. Then the wheelchair ceremony was held, the JIL with Sakura organization donated 25 wheelchairs for the needy participants. We are thankful to JIL for their cooperation and concern for this task, they have been a great help in this journey. The participants who received wheelchairs were really excited and full of joy and satisfaction because of wheelchair matters a lot for them in terms of mobility. The musical night ended with lot of twist memories and tiredness as well. The next day 6th July was full of games including Tug of War, Long Jump, Table Tennis etc. But most excited and the focus of the audience and organizations was the Cricket Final as ever, it has always been the most important event since the games started. After hard competition, the Milestone Society for the Special Person and an organization from Islamabad won their Semi Finals and qualified for Final. Both the teams excited and inspired to win the cricket Final. The Milestone won the toss and decided to bat. The stadium was full of slogans and encouraging claps. The players from Islamabad bowled well but the Milestone players had shot for the every ball and scored 57 runs in six over. Though it was not a hard chase but the Milestone bowlers and fielders played well. The batsmen from Islamabad were playing well heading towards chase. They scored 54 runs in 5.5 over and at the last boll they required just 2 runs to win and only one run to draw. Those were the tense moments for both the Teams and for all the participants, Mr. Goshi from Milestone delivered the last ball that was missed by the batsmen from Islamabad and the Milestone won the cricket Final by 2 runs on the last ball of the last over, it was really an interesting and hard match, both the teams played well. The Milestone members excited with this victory started dancing in the ground with the Army Band playing Bhangra tone. All the players greeted and encouraged each other. Its not competition in fact, its just an encouraging event where all the disabled persons from all over Pakistan get together to play and share their problems, it is a platform where everybody can raise his voice which becomes a collective task to work out. After these days full of excited games of the Abbottabad Sports ended with lot of cherish memories. It is worth mentioning here that Qarshi donated Banners, Shields and Prizes for the Abbottabad Sports Festival, we are highly thankful to Qarshi for their kindness and concern for disability issues. Then in the evening the Chief Guest Mr.General distributed the prizes among the players. This prize distribution was a ray of hope for the disabled persons that if they work hard then they can face any challenge and become triumph.
The Milestone Society for Special Persons had a dream to organize a sports festival of magnitude that disabled persons from all over Pakistan can participate and enjoy the sports fever like ordinary people. This was an ambitious plan to meet but with the struggle and commitment by the society people and collaborated effort by the financers to provide the crucial money for this ambitious plan came to reality, it is worth mentioning here that this was made possible by the collaborated help of Sight Savers, Mercy Corps, Handicap International, HOAP, Qarshi, Balouch Regiment, District Sports Office Abbottabad NWFP and the commitment showed by the disabled persons form all over Pakistan.
Posted by jicafriends at July 25, 2006 03:23 PM
Comments
very good,good activity milestone promot the disabled persons
Posted by: RIZWAN IJAZ at May 30, 2007 06:25 PM