The Union Council level of the of the Punjab Youth Festival 2012 attracted around 50,000 youngsters to different sporting events on day four of the second phase despite interruptions caused by rain in the province on Wednesday. The Punjab Youth Festival 2012 that rolled into action on August 26 at Neighbourhood and Village level entered into its second phase on September 8 and during the last four days there has been active indoor activity with participation of more than 200,000 throughout the province while the outdoor activity was slow due to the previous days’ wet spell that lashed the entire Punjab, particularly the southern side.
In the general events like naat khani, qirat, dress making and cooking there was around 2000 young boys and girls who took part in the competitions in Lahore. The dress making and cooking events are being held under the supervision of Urban Development Department. In the nine towns of Lahore, Data Ganj Bax Town, Gulberg, Shalimar, Nashtar and Iqbal Towns keenly contested in different events. In Bodybuilding competitions of UC 149 of Data Ganj Baz Town, Mohammad Suhail Virk, Yusuf, Tipu Sindhu were the winners in their weight categories. In weightlifting competitions, Faizan, Khurram, Hafiz Mohammed Usman and Abdullah won the classes of weight. In Badminton, Union council 150, Asad Yusuf beat Ahmed 2-0 (20-17, 20-11). In Arm Wrestling, Nadeem and Moazzam won the competitions against Naeem and Aslam respectively while in Tug of war and Cricket tapeball, Union council 5 were declared winners.
In Iqbal Town, Union council 114’s Naeem, Asim and Jazam beat Zeeshan, Usman and Rizwan in badminton tournament. Union council 116’s Tariq, Umer Farooq, Umer and Sharafat won their Arm Wrestling competitions. In Union council 116, Haris defeated Saad 2-0 in Billiard. Union council 95’s, Cricket tapeball team of block 7 got walkover. In Union council 96, block 8 beat block 3 by 18 runs. In Shalimar, Union council 19’s Qamar XI beat block 20’s team by 8 wickets. In Arm Wrestling of the same UC, Mohammd Tayyab bagged first, Asad secured second and Safiullah got third positions in sequence. In Athletics, Union Council 20’s Ahmed Farooq , Safiullah and Tahir were the winners first, second and third in 100 metres and 200 metres races respectively.
In Nishtar Town, Union Council 136’ Cricket tapeball matches were held in which Rashid beat Amir three runs, Liaqat beat Muzammil 10 runs and Khuram defeated Ali by two wickets. In Union Council 137 cricket tapeball Nazim XI won the final against Ramzan XI by four runs. In Union Council 134, cricket tapeball, Shad Khan XI beat Qaiser XI by seven wickets.
The other districts of Punjab, 917 Union Councils took part in 345 events including tug or war, volleyball, cricket tapeball, football, athletics, badminton, arm wrestling, billiard, weightlifting, bodybuilding while there were also passionate contest of naat khani and qirat.
Rawalpindi had the participation of around 5500 from more than 200 union councils in 78 events while in the Rawalpindi City alone 2500 of 81 UCs took part in 30 events. In Sargodha Division, Bhakkar was the most active district where around 3293 youngsters took part in 15 events. Here around 30 Union Councils got involved in the competitions of arm wrestling, athletics, cricket, tug of war, volleyball, naat khani and qirat.
In Gujranwala, 210 UCs had competitions in 48 events with the participation of around 7458 youngsters while in Gujranwala city alone 4917 took part in29 events in which 143 Union Councils got involved. At Faisalabad, 186 UCs’ 6627 contested for top honours in 50 events and in Faisalabad city 5022 had competitions in 34 events from 77 UCs. Similarly, over 5500 took part in 32 events in Multan division where around 100 UCs had active involvement in the events.
