Final day of Meghalaya’s Cherry Blossom Fest to begin after Church services

Organizers directed to adjust timeline of Cherry Blossom Fest

Staff Reporter

Shillong, Oct 26: The state government has directed the organizers of the upcoming Shillong Cherry Blossom Festival to start the programme scheduled on November 19, after church service following opposition of its conclusion on a Sunday.

Informing this today, Deputy Chief Minister in-charge of Home (Police) Prestone Tynsong also assured that the government will ensure that next year the festival will not be held on a Sunday.

“See if you talk about Sunday or Saturday or Friday see sometimes it happens the last day sometimes it happens it ends on Sunday or may be the starting it happens on Sunday or Saturday or Friday. Let me just assure the people of the State this is not that we really wanted to do it during Sunday but this is a programme of 3-4 days so it happened that it ended on a Sunday,” Tynsong said while adding “What we decided is we have already instructed even those organizers for this time since it ended on Sunday let the function start maybe after 3 pm in the afternoon of Sunday let it start after the church service.”

“I would appeal to everybody to let us be cool and calm and we will see from next year onwards to calculate the date accordingly so that everybody is happy and everybody is also benefited out of this festival,” he added further.

Tourism Minister Paul Lyngdoh had recently stated that there is a political motive behind opposition against the festival.

Tynsong however said there is nothing wrong in people expressing their sentiments about the issue.

“I would like to say that this is the sentimental step because it is so sentimental. People I think you understand well here it is known as a Christian state. Some of our church leaders or even members of the NGOs they have that sentiment, I appreciate that sentiment no doubt about it, from the government side I don’t say it is wrong it is right but for this festival which is going to happen next month I have already told you for the ending part to adjust accordingly, we have decided, we already ask the organizers to start the function only after the church service,” the deputy chief minister said even as he concluded by saying “We are all sinners, God have mercy on us 24×7 including you.”

Conrad inspects upgrade of JN stadium

Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma on Wednesday inspected the ongoing renovation, up-gradation and expansion of the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium at Polo in Shillong.

The renovated stadium would include a football ground with natural grass turf and also a state-of-the-art facility for hosting track and field events.

Laying emphasis on the quality of the construction, the Chief Minister informed that the highest quality standards are being maintained and once ready will be fit to host international sporting events.

“The entire arrangements and the way the work is going on, we are going to meet the FIFA standards and this particular stadium and the football field will be at par to host any international games in the future”, he said.

“Apart from this, the stadium will have full facilities for athletics and the quality that is being maintained here for the track and field is also top of the line”, he added.

The Chief Minister the renovated stadium will have a seating capacity of close to 30,000 and will be completed by the month of December this year.

Adjacent to the Football Stadium, a multipurpose indoor stadium is also being constructed.

The Chief Minister informed that it will be the largest multipurpose indoor stadium in the Northeastern region. The indoor stadium will have facilities for different disciplines such as basketball, squash, badminton, table tennis, volleyball, etc.

Expressing his happiness at the progress of the work, the Chief Minister was optimistic that once the state-of-the-art facilities are completed it will provide an opportunity for the youth of the State to excel in the respective field and sporting disciplines.

During his visit, the Chief Minister also inspected the football field located at the first ground Polo. Necessary upgrade and expansion are being carried out to improve the ground with the laying of an artificial turf and the construction of new stands.

Stating that the youth of the State are passionate about football, the Chief Minister said that the Government is in the process to identify local practice grounds across the State and take steps to upgrade and improve the selected grounds for the benefit of football lovers.

“The Government has decided that we are going to take up different locality fields and football grounds in all parts of the State where our youth normally play football and in collaboration with the community and the local leaders we would want to upgrade these grounds with better facilities”.

“We are already surveying Shillong city and we have identified five locations where we can potentially lay these astro turfs. With this intervention we are expecting that a large number of astro turf football grounds will come up, where our youth can practise, have matches. That will be one of the steps towards ensuring that we are able to bring out the talent and give the opportunity for the youth who are passionate about football”, he said.

The ongoing construction of an Integrated Hospitality and Sports Complex at JN Stadium is at a cost of 125 crore, while the upgrade of JN Sports Complex Phase I is at a cost of 34.75 crore, while the upgrade of Phase II is 18.2 crore and the upgrade of SSA ground at 14.81 crore.

The integrated sports complex will comprise of 700-seater Multi Sports Hall, Convention Hall that can house 12 badminton courts, an independent Banquet hall with a dedicated kitchen facility, 200 seater Basketball or Futsal Indoor Sports Hall,  Indoor Sports Hall for Squash (2 Nos.) and Table tennis (10 Nos.), 10 M and 25 M Shooting range.