The Bangladesh Olympic Association has earmarked Tk 90 lakh for the upcoming Asian Indoor Martial Art Games and the Asian Youth Games although only a small amount of this sum will be utilised for training and preparation of the athletes.
The Asian Indoor Martial Art Games will be taking place for the first time in Incheon, South Korea, from June 29 to July 6 where five athletes from Bangladesh will be taking part in two disciplines.
The BOA will bear all expenses of four chess players while the Bangladesh Billiard Federation will send one player on their own.
The BOA also proposed to the Bangladesh Kabaddi Federation that they can send the women’s national kabaddi team on their own funds.
However, the BKF rejected the proposal citing a lack of funds.
‘The BOA recognised that the women’s national kabaddi team have the potential to claim a medal from the Asian Indoor Martial Art Games though they refused to bear the expenses of the players. We do not have sufficient funds to send the team,’ said Nazrul Islam, general secretary of the BKF.
The BOA will disburse Tk 6.5 lakh for the athletes’ training and they will also distribute Tk 25 lakh among eight athletes and officials travelling to South Korea.
Meanwhile, 17 athletes will participate in seven disciplines in the second edition of the Asian Youth Games which is scheduled to get underway on August 16 in Nanjing, China.
The total budget has been set at Tk 59 lakh by the BOA for participation in the Asian Youth Games although only Tk 12 lakh will be used for a two-month long training camp which is set to begin from the middle of June.
The BOA informed that they did not receive any assistance from the government for these two forthcoming Games. They went forward with their planning through their own funding, so they were unable to bring the athletes in a proper preparation scheme.
‘We did not get any backing from the National Sports Council so we could not start the training camp for the Asian Youth Games from the first week of this month. Instead, we will begin training from the middle of this month,’ said Wing Commander Rafiqul Islam, member-secretary of the BOA’s training and development committee.
15-year-old shuttler Ayman Ibne Jaman, who
clinched the gold medal in the badminton individual men’s event of the eighth Bangladesh Games, will travel to the Asian Youth Games on his own cost.
However, some of the athletes who performed admirably in the recently concluded Bangladesh Games are staying back in the country due to different reasons.
Rabbi Hasan Munna, winner of the 10-meter air rifle shooting event after defeating renowned shooter Abdullah Hel Baki, failed to attain a place in the Asian Youth Games contingent.
The National Shooting Federation of Bangladesh notified that they had selected four shooters for the Asian Youth Games – BKSP’s Risalatul Islam, Hasan Al Banna, Sharmin Akhter and Savar Shooting Club’s Sharmin Akhter long before the Bangladesh Games had begun so Rabbi missed out on a place.
The fastest man of the nation, Mezbah Ahmed will also miss the Asian Youth Games as Ashik Kumar Halder was selected ahead of him by the Bangladesh Athletics Federation.
-With New Age input
