‘Sports, physical activity as important as academics’

Annual sports week of government high school, Sarbura, Dimapur, began today with director, Nagaland Post Aochuba Yaden as the chief guest.

Speaking before students and teachers, Aochuba said many consider sports as a mere extra curricular activity; however he said one has to understand that sports and physical activity are as important as academics. “It moulds a persons character, behaviour and personality in all spheres.”
 
He said the whole process of sports involves discipline, focus, patience, determination, sense of oneness and team spirit and that all of these should come from within.

“Nobody can force you to develop these qualities, we need to have a strong will and with all these components, one can achieve the goal that we seek for”, Aochuba said and at the same time, added that physical activity by itself meant health, which is wealth.

“In life one should know learn to be a good looser and also a good winner-a good looser to analyze what went wrong and what needs to be done to fight hard and a good winner-to look back and retrospect where one can do better, to reach a higher level rather than living life with past glories”, Aochuba said.

Aochuba quoted Dan Gable, a famous wrestler who once said, “Gold medals aren’t really made of gold. They’re made of sweat, determination, and a hard-to-find alloy called guts.”

He said Nagas have still not come out of the box to develop oneself into real time professionals- be it in sports, music, business etc., and added that there was a need to have a broader outlook in life.

He said one should not seek only government jobs, with limited opportunities, adding there are far better avenues and benefits in areas like sport, music and business etc.

Citing an example, he said, Gagan Narang, who clinched bronze medal in London Olympics 2012, the then sports minister Ajay Maken, announced that he would be offered a job as a “Group A” employee in Sports Authority of India, which is equivalent to an IAS officer’s rank.

He said this was one of the best examples, where government jobs come at your door-steps, rather than using all means to get one.

“Though we lack basic facilities and government support, I know and have a strong feeling that we Nagas can achieve in the near future, in areas like shooting, archery and even Sepak-Takraw, which has brought laurels to the state”, said Yaden.

Stating that it was his dream and passion to promote shooting, Yaden said that he would be happy to help anyone who was interested to learn and acquire basic training that the Rifle Club imparts.

He also congratulated Government High School, Sarbura, for completing 56 years and said the school should be proud of having a national award winner like K. Jeliangga who was the head teacher earlier.

The school  has become a role model not only among the government schools but private schools as well. He also donated cash towards the school.

In his concluding remarks, Yaden said “We should first put God before anything. Without  His blessings and guidance nothing can be achieved”.

He said that God has sent us to this earth for a purpose, whether weak or strong, rich or poor, everyone has a purpose and to achieve that we need to remain analytical, think seriously and remain focus.

Earlier, the inaugural programme was chaired by assistant teacher, Sentienla, invocation prayer by VEC chairman, M. Panger, welcome address by head teacher, C. Amongla, oath taking of the participants by Sanen, PeT.