Sports Minister Kiran Rijiju presented cash prizes to medal winners at the South Asian Games (SAG) held in Nepal. SAG games ended on Tuesday in which India topped for the 13th consecutive time. India won 312 medals including 174 gold, 93 silver and 45 bronze. One and a half lakh rupees were given to the gold medal winners, one lakh to the silver medal winners and Rs 50,000 to the bronze medalists. Rijiju said at the award distribution ceremony, "We will formulate a cash prize policy for medal winners in South Asian Games in the coming years, such as for the Olympics, Asian Games and Commonwealth Games."
Asked about the failure of shooter Ravi Kumar and Boxer Sumit Sangwan in the dope test, he said, "Doping is a serious issue all over the world." Games should be clean and transparent. We are trying to raise awareness about doping. He said, "Players should not be misled due to lack of information. We want to make every player aware so that they does not fall into the trap of doping." Sports Minister Kiran Rijiju is expecting the best performance by the country's players so far at the Tokyo Olympics.
The Sports Minister said that the next year's Tokyo Olympics is an immediate target but there is a need to create infrastructure for the players to perform well in future competitions. Rijiju said, 'Tokyo is our immediate target with the current talent. We cannot prepare champions overnight. It is not possible to produce a world champion in a year or two. We have to ensure that the entire infrastructure is ready.'
