In an endeavour to impart self defence lessons to girl students, the State Government has started a project to teach martial arts in the Government girls’ schools of the State. The pilot project will be undertaken in Dehradun district.
The Minister of Forests and Sports, Dinesh Aggarwal took a meeting of Principals of Government girl schools and Chief Education Officer (CEO) of Dehradun on Tuesday and discussed the implementation aspects of the project. In the meeting the Minister directed the education department officials to earmark 10 schools each in rural and urban areas where the training of Judo and Karate could be imparted to the girls. The students of the IX, X, XI and XII would be included in the project and they would be given lessons in martial art skills by the experts. Agarwal asked the Chairman of Judo and Karate association Satish Sharma to prepare a detailed blueprint of the project and submit it to the department officials as early as possible.
The State Government plans to include all the districts of the state in the project after its successful implementation in Dehradun district. In the third phase the Government intends to include private schools in the project.
Explaining the long term benefit of the project the sports minister told the officials that apart from teaching self defence techniques to the girls, employment opportunities would be created for large number of judo and karate trainers in the State. The safety of girls is one of the big issue concerning the parents and the government.
Experts are of the view that the proposed move would instill confidence in the girls and would be step in the direction of ensuring their safety.
The meeting was attended by Deputy Director Sports Ajay Kumar Agarwal, Joint Secretary Sports lakshman Singh, CEO Dehradun SP Khali, district sports officer SK Sarki and Principals of various Government Girls Inter colleges.