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Meeting of the Senate Special Committee on "The Promotion and Development of Football in the Country" was held here at Parliament House on Friday with Senator Faisal Saleem Rahman as Convener.

At the outset, Senator Faisal Saleem Rahman lauded the Pakistan Women Football team over their victory against Maldives in SAFF Women's Championship.

The committee was apprised by Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) regarding the efforts for promotion and development of football in the Country. Muhammad Asif Zaman, DG PSB, told the committee that the total funds allocated to Pakistan Football Federation out of total budget for sports activities from last 20 years is around Rs.137,261,950 and Government of Pakistan have made 32 football arenas in all the provinces and 250 more sports arenas are in pipeline and football grounds have been made part of these projects.

Addition to that, representatives of Provincial Sports Departments informed that in Punjab there are 69 football grounds and total budget for football is around Rs. 20 crores, however, there are 25 football grounds in Sindh and 97 in Balochistan, Sindh spends around 10 to 20 pc of their annual sports budget on football. Senator Faisal Saleem Rahman sought details of football grounds, located in KPK, from KPK Sports Department in the next meeting.

Deliberating on the issues faced by Pakistan Football Federation, Mubashir Rafiq, member of the Senate committee, raised the recent incident of Pakistan Futsal players who went to participate in Futsal World Cup but deported back from Dubai airport because they were planning to fleed away from Argentina. Muhammad Asif Nawaz stated that due to last episode of Syed Ashfaq Shah, which resulted in Bann on Pakistan Football Federation, things went sideways but the ministry has formulated 'New Sports Policy' and after it's implementation players will not be able to leave the country without prior approval from ministry of interior and foreign affairs. The convener directed the ministry to conduct inquiry of the matter and present report before the committee at earliest.

Moverever, the senate committee also discussed the matter regarding the election of President of Pakistan Football Federation. DG Pakistan Sports Board told that after the recent episode of Syed Ashafaq the FIFA has formulated the four members Normalization Committee which is currently scrutinizing the football clubs across the country and date for the election will be decided once it's completed. Senator Afnan Ullah Khan inquired that in how much period the scrutiny will be completed. In reply to that, Saud Hashimi, member of Normalization committee, informed that it will be completed in 4 months. Senator Afnan Ullah Khan also suggested that the provincial sports board should also be made part of the process.

The convener of committee opined that Inter School Sports competition should also be started so that the children of tender age could take keen interest in football and for this purpose invited the Education ministry and HEC in the next meeting.

The meeting was attended by Senator Syed Muhammad Sabir Shah, Senator Khalida Ateeb, Senator Afnan Ullah Khan, Ahmed Kakar, VP, QCCI, Mubashir Rafiq, Anas Trunkwala, Owner, World Group, Secretary IPC Ahmad Hanif, DG Pakistan Sports Board Col. (R) Muhammad Asif Zaman and other concerned officers were also in attendance.