PYF 2014: Athletics Competitions of Blind and Special Persons Courageously Contested

Lahore: The one-day Athletics Meet for Blind and Special Persons under the auspices of the Punjab Youth Festival was organised here at the Punjab Stadium on Friday.

A large number of special persons participated in various Athletics Meets. They were generously encouraged by the spectators present in the stadium. The chief guest Hafeez Bhatti, Deputy Director Sports Board Punjab, distributed prizes among the top performers.

Shahzad Akram of Sahiwal sprinted to glory in boys’ 100m Race Of Blind. Umer Fayyaz of Faisalabad and M Danish Bhatti of Rawalpindi grabbed second and third positions respectively. The title of 50m Girls’ Race of Blind went to Lahore’s Huma Ashraf while the remaining two top positions were clinched by Attiyya Allah Bakhsh of Sargodha and Wajeeha Shafiq of Rawalpindi.

In the Boys’ 100m Race For Deaf, Fakhar Iqbal of Rawalpindi emerged as victorious followed by Sargodha’s M Zahid and Rashid Ali of Faisalabad. In the Girls’ 50m Race of the same category, Sahiwal’s Neelum Mukhtar returned home successful while Amna Batool of Multan and Sobia Hayat of Sargodha got second and third spots respectively.

The title of disabled persons’ Wheelchair Race was taken by Multan’s Ahmed Yar followed by Lahore’s M Ishaq and Rawalpindi’s Qaiser Mehmood. Multan’s M Matloob, Faisalabad’s Imtiaz Hussain and Saqib Naveed of Sahiwal ran away with top three positions in 100m Race of One-Armed Persons. The 50m Girls’ Title of this category was won by Sargodha’s Tahira Hayat. Alisha Saleem of Lahore and Ishrat Perveen of Faisalabad bagged the remaining positions.

The 100m Boys’ Race Of Mentally-Retarded Persons was won by Gujranwala’s Sultan Ahmed while Shahzad Maqbool of Lahore took second and Sargodha’s Rizwan finished third in this race. Sumaira Batool of Sargodha met with success in the 50m Girls’ Race Of Mentally-Retarded while the remaining two positions were won by Zobia Rani of Gujranwala and Multan’s Nusrat respectively.

In the Special Persons Powerlifting event held at coaching centre, Sajjad Masih clinched the best powerlifter award. Tahir Baloch of Sargodha Division won the 62kg category while Azam Mukhtar (Multan Division) was second and Naveed from DG Khan Division third. Sajjad Masih of Lahore Division won the first position in 77kg Weight Category, Nabeel (Faisalabad Division) got second and M. Luqman stood third. Qaiser Mehmood of Rawalpindi was the winner in 94kg Weight Category.

Former MPA Sohail Zia Butt was the chief guest and was accompanied by DG. Sports Board Punjab, Mr. Usman Anwar. Aqeel Javed Butt was the Tournament Director.