Khelo India Games declared open

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday declared the Khelo India School Games open at the Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium, saying the event would highlight sporting talent and its potential to the world.

“Khelo India is not only about winning medals. It is an effort to give strength to a mass movement for playing more. We want to focus on every aspect that would make sports more popular across the nation,” the Prime Minister said.

He said it was important to develop the grassroot level. “We have decided to select 1,000 children every year from different sports and provide them Rs 5 lakh per annum for eight years,” he said.

The KISG is being held across 16 disciplines in the U-17 category and 5,000 school children from 29 states and seven union territories have arrived to participate in the event that ends on February 8.

Meanwhile, Anu Kumar of Uttarakhand grabbed the first gold medal of the Games, as Tamil Nadu won two of six gold medals on offer on the opening day of the athletics programme.

The other three were shared between Kerala, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana.