Chief Minister of Goa, Dr.Pramod Sawant honoured the extraordinary achievements and felicitated the successful Goan contingent that recently returned to Goa with a glorious haul of 19 medals at the 2023 Special Olympics World Summer Games, held in Berlin from June 17-25.
At a special felicitation function organised to congratulate the 15 athletes and 8 coaches, Dr Sawant said: “Our special athletes have made us all proud with their medals. They have shown great courage, determination and skill in the (Special) Olympic Games. I am delighted to announce that we will reward each of them with a cash prize of 5 lakhs for gold, 3 lakhs for silver and 1 lakh for bronze. The prize money will be given to them within two months. Moreover, we will offer them a chance to work in the government sector in the future. They deserve this recognition and support.”
“All the hard work has paid off and this has been proved today. This success in Berlin goes to all involved – the NGOs, the workers, the families of the athletes and the officials. We are next hosting the National Games in Goa in October this year, and I am certain we will start thinking of hosting a National Games for Special Athletes perhaps even by next year,” he added.
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The medal winners felicitated at the function were: Venson Paes, Joel Rodrigues, Francis Parisapogu and Aman Nadaf (Gold, 7-a-side football),Manfil Ferrao (Gold, Basketball), Veena Naik (Gold, Volleyball unified), Geetanjali Nagvenkar (Gold, 800 mts, Silver, 400 mts),Aslam Ganjanawar (Silver, Judo), Aayush Gadekar (Silver, Volleyball unified) Taniya Usgaonkar (Silver and Bronze, Skating), and Siya Sarode (Gold, Deadlift & Squat, Silver, Combine Lift, Bronze, Bench press), Gayban Mulla (Bronze, Mini Javelin), Gayatri Fatarpekar and Kajal Jadhav (Bronze, 7-a-side football) and Asif Malani (4th place 4×400 mts relay).
The eight coaches from Goa, include Varsha Naik, Prakash Velip, Gautami Dessai, Samantha D’Costa, Saffira D’Costa, Kazmiro Fernandes, Sr. Monica Coelho and Prashant Tari.
Minister of Social Welfare Subhash Phal Dessai speaking during the felicitation ceremony, said: “These athletes who have brought laurels to Goa, worked very hard to reach this pinnacle of success. But, with or without a medal, each of you who have participated at the Special Olympics World Summer Games is indeed special and winners in your own right. Our Government is working on implementing policies that will benefit persons with disabilities and this will be in the right direction to empower PwD and to motivate them to do better in various spheres of their life.”
Guruprasad Pawaskar, Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities expressing joy said: “It is inspiring to be among such talented persons who have brought laurels to our state and country by winning a haul of 19 medals which is highly commendable. A total of 15 athletes and 8 coaches from Goa were part of the Indian sqaud. This clearly shows that our Goan athletes are highly competitive and are of international standard. The Special Olympics witnessed extraordinary performances by our talented athletes, who displayed unmatched skill, indomitable spirit, and unwavering dedication throughout the competition.”
National Sports Director of Special Olympics Bharat, Victor Vaz expressed his joy. He said “This year’s medal tally is the best in Goa’s history. With 9 gold medals, 5 silver and 5 bronze this is the first by far the best ever gold haul. And with this performance goa has now crossed the three figure medal mark with the tally of 102 medals in the 8 editions of the games that we participated so far.None of this success came easy, it took months and months of accurate planning. Infact we had the core of our team ready at least 2 years back. All this dedication has led to the medal haul that we see today.”