Govt forms committee to use CWG stadia for London Olympics

New Delhi, Feb 5 (PTI) With the 2012 London Olympics just15 months away, the sports ministry today decided to form afour-member committee comprising sportspersons, to utiliseall stadia built during the Commonwealth Games for thepreparation of national teams.

Newly-appointed union sports minister Ajay Maken todayvisited all Stadia of SAI to oversee their maintenance andsaid they are coming out with a blueprint for the proper useof these infrastructure.

"We have decided to form a committee comprising formerand current sportspersons like PT Usha, Mary Kom, BaichungBhutia and Dilip Tirkey. Veteran journalist K Datta will alsobe a member of the committee, headed by the secretary ofsports," Maken told reporters at the Jawaharlal Nehru stadiumhere.

"We have requested these renowned sportspersons to giveus suggestions within four weeks as how can we best utilisethe stadia. They will have their first meeting on Monday," headded.

Maken said all the stadia would be used by national teamsfor preparation of the 2012 London Olympics, besides hostingcompetitions and as academies to train budding athletes.

"We will use these stadia mainly for three purposes. One,for the children and budding players we intend to use it asacademies. Two, keeping in view the London Olympics we willuse these for the training of the national teams, and three,to host international and national tournaments," he said.

"We are also making an annual calender for hostingtournaments here," he added.

Asked about the maintenance of the stadia, Maken saidthey have decided to entrust the responsibility on NDMC, SAIand the CPWD.

"As far as the maintenance is concerned, we have decidedto hand over three of the five stadia to NDMC for cleaning andscavenging. Rest of the two stadia will be maintained by SAIauthorities.

"Also CPWD has constructed these stadia. Till now theCPWD had to do the maintenance till March 31 so we areconsidering to allow CPWD to further maintain these stadia asthey are in a better position. So instead of going for a PPPmodel, the government would like to see that these aremaintained properly," he said. .