Sports Minister Kiran Rijiju on Tuesday spoke to the athletes of the Sports Authority of India (Sai) at the National Center of Excellence and the Bengaluru Center in Patiala and learned about their needs and ideas to start training after the lockdown was lifted. The Sports Minister spoke to 40 athletes from different sports including Hima Das, Neeraj Chopra, Tejinder Toor, Katie Irfan, Shivpal Singh, Poovamma, Jinson Johnson and Mohammad Anas. Every player accepted the lack of real training due to coronavirus and appealed to the minister to start ground training in Bengaluru and Patilaya centers.
The meeting was attended by Sports Secretary Ravi Mittal, Sai General Director Sandeep Pradhan, Athletics Federation of India (AFI) President Adile Sumariwala. Sumriwala said, "Players want to start training but we have ensured them that players have to follow the rest of the health protocols set by the Social Distancing and Standard Operating Procedure (SOP)."
Rijiju said, "We have formed a committee for SOP. Your suggestions are very important for us to make rules. I hope we all will reach a decision soon." He said, "However, it is like a national emergency and no ministry can work alone. We will have to talk to the Home Ministry as well as the Health Ministry and then take a decision."
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