Pioneer sports administrator and present special advisor to the Ministry of Education Sunil Jayaweera launched his fourth edition of the athletic (track and field’s) rules 2018-2019 book on Friday at the Football House auditorium with the support of Nestle Lanka.
Renowned sports celebrity Susanthika Jayasinghe and administrators were present on the occasion while Sunil Hettiarachchi secretary general of the Ministry of Education was the chief guest.
Jayaweera said that in Sri Lanka most athletes participated in track and field events and athletes, tournament organizers and officials should be well aware of the rules and regulations according to the international IAAF standards.
“I launched my first book called Track and Field Event Judges in the 2004 rules editions book in 2008 and 2013. “Our new edition of track and field’s rules and regulations is in accordance with amendments of IAAF rules for 2018 and 2019 and is not a translation of the IAAF regulation book”, said Jayaweera. Jayaweera functioned as a sports officer and joined the Education Ministry in 1983 as Deputy Director of Sports and in 1997 he functioned as the Deputy Director General of Sports.
In 1984 when Ranil Wickremasinghe functioned as the Minister of Sports, the National Schools Sports concept was worked off efficiently by Jayaweera and the sports level in schools shot up.
The outcome of this was Susanthika Jayasinghe winning the Sydney Olympics Silver medal in the 200 metres while Sugath Tillekeratne, the present Athletics president, Damayanthi Darsha, Sriyani Kulawansa, Rohan Pradeep Perera and a host of Asian and Commonwealth Games medalists emerged.
Hettirachchi said the Ministry of Education always encouraged a good cause to develop sports at school level.
“According to statics only 28 sports are active at school level from a list of 62 sports disciplines at national level and our main goal is to increase this in the future. We also need to encourage indoor sports”, he said.