On a four day private visit to Dharmasala, the God of cricket Sachin Tendulkar met Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama and also launched the Khel Mahakumbh initiated by MP Anurag Thakur.
Khel Mahakumbh launched in Dharamsala
Member of Parliament and Former BCCI President Anurag Thakur and cricketing great Sachin Tendulkar launched ‘Khel Mahakumbh’ in the presence of 1500 athletes.
The event aims to attract the participation of at least one lakh youth from Thakur’s Hamirpur constituency. The athletes will compete in volleyball, basketball, cricket, football, kabaddi, and athletics.
“I firmly believe that sports has the power to shape personalities and contribute immensely towards the holistic growth of an individual,” said Thakur at the launch
“To ensure that the participation is not limited and the remotest of the village resident gets a fair chance to excel, the initiative has been designed in a manner that it seeks participation from youth across 5000 villages and 800 panchayats,” he added further.
Thakur added that over Rs 1 crore will be invested in the project over the next five years.
Talking about the initiative, Tendulkar said: “Sports can indeed play a pivotal role in shaping lives and such initiatives help in reinforcing this by providing a platform to the budding talent.”
The registration will be done on grounds across panchayats from May 4-20.
When God of Cricket met His Holiness Dalai Lama
Legendary cricketer Sachin Tendulkar, who is on a four-day private visit to Dharamsala, visited Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama at his adopted home in McLeod Ganj.
After meeting the Dalai Lama, Sachin Tendulkar said that he felt ecstatic to seek the Tibetan leader’s blessing, adding that the duo talked about spreading happiness and communal harmony.
“It was an excellent, very good meeting. I always wanted to be here and take the blessings. Just wanted to spend some time and say hello to him. We talked about spreading happiness and communal harmony,” Tendulkar told media persons.
The spiritual leader of the Tibetans lives above the Himachal Pradesh Cricket Association (HPCA) Stadium ground, where Tendulkar visited for the launch of Khel Mahakumbh.
The former opener, who is accompanied by his wife Anjali, had earlier met young cricketers at the HPCA Stadium.
Considered as one of the greatest batsmen of all time, Tendulkar is the highest run scorer of all time in international cricket – having notched up 18,426 ODI runs and 15,921 Test cricket runs. He is the only cricketer to have hit 100 international centuries, and the first to score a double century in ODIs.
The Mumbaikar received India’s highest civilian award Bharat Ratna in 2014. He is the youngest recipient to date and the first ever sportsperson to receive the award.
