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Hemant Soren, the Chief minister of Jharkhand, has made an assurance of building a football stadium for a group of teenage girl footballers, who played exceedingly well in an international tournament.
The group of 18 girls belong to the Hutup village in the state of Jharkhand. They represented the U-14 Yuva-India team at two international football events over the last month.
Yuva-India is an NGO that is founded and run by Franz Gaslter, an American citizen who had first come to Jharkhand four years back to teach young children in the state’s villages.
The Chief Minister has promised to build the stadium at the Dhanumojha village which is close to where the girls practice.
The stadium is reported to come up within the next six months. In addition, cash prizes would also be provided to the girls on August 29, which is the National Sports Day.
“These girls have performed wonderfully even with the limited facilities available to them. The government will take all steps to support and encourage them to pursue the sport they have chosen and award them Rs. 21,000 and a sports kit each,” Soren told The Hindu.
The girls participated in the Gasteiz Cup held in Spain and won the third spot amongst ten teams who took part. They then went on to the Donosti Cup which is Spain’s biggest football tournament and reached the quarter-finals in a 36-team tournament.
This whole tour was over a three-week period and was sponsored by Gamesa, which is a Spanish wind energy company.
“We felt good that the Chief Minister met us. We have told him that we do not have a proper ground to practise and that sometimes our families find it difficult to pay school fees. We will inform him as and when problems come up,” said Neeta Kumari, a 11-year-old member of the team.
