Women on skates on Sunday got a new puck to the ice hockey in the dizzying heights of an open- air ice rink in Kaza town in the snowy Spiti cold desert.
This five-day long 9th national ice hockey games came as a smorgasbord of ice and snow, dance and monastic colour with a new hope. The games will give a new push to promotion of ice hockey in Lahaul-Spiti and Mountain region.
But Indian ice hockey has to go long miles before it would make its mark in international arenas. The women and men in Ladakh, Lahaul-Spiti, Uttarakhand, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir have a natural flair for playing winter games. "They need equipment, ice rinks and coaches for training. Their potential needs to be tapped to fullest as there is no dearth of talent among the youth in the region, they say.
In Ladakh ice hockey has become a passion. Every year, schools and local NGOs and snow sports clubs host local ice and snow games for the youth in Leh and Kargil districts.
In Shimla city, the ice hockey has failed to be promoted on professional line as the Rivoli Ice Rink, which is Asia’s first natural ice rink, is marred by warm weather conditions and infringements from encroachers in the rink arena. “We don’t get enough ice season to play ice hocky as ice layer is not up to the required standards, rued the ice players.
As per International Ice Federation standard, the women ice hockey currently compete in a 10 team tournament whereas men compete in a 12- team tournament. But as many as six teams could make way to Kaza for the 9th women ice hockey games representing Himachal Pradesh, Telengana, Ladakh, ITBP Ladakh, Chandigarh and Delhi. Main difference between women’s and men’s ice hockey is that body checking is not allowed in women ice hockey.
Ice Hockey Association of India (IHAI), formed in 1989, conducts the games and then select India ice hockey team for the international events, informed players. But IHAI has yet to get to the heart of matter to take Khalo India campaign right into the potential areas of the mountain region.
As many as six women ice hockey teams are participating in the ice hockey games being held in Kaza, sub-divisional headquarter for the first time. Kaza town and entire Spiti valley wear a three feet thick blanket of snow that have added special attraction for the visitors, who could not turn up this time due to a surge in covid cases.
The inaugural match was played between the ITBP and Ladakh teams after Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur, the chief guest, who air-dashed from Shimla and opened the national games.
Thakur accompanied by Dr Ram Lal Markande, cabinet minister and legislator from Lahual-Spiti including Suresh Bhardwaj, Pawan Rana and Puneet Sharma got a traditional reception from the residents of Spiti.
During the inauguration, the Ice hockey team members and a thin presence of guests got an eye-catching fast rhythmic dance on skates on ice rink performed by the talented girl students of the Kaza senior secondary school.
The men and women ice hockey skaters also performed another soul-stirring dance on the ice rink. The army bandmen added the runny tunes of different songs that echoed in the chilled and quiet atmosphere of the snowy Spiti valley.
Local Buddhist gentry of Spiti gave a monastic look to the all-women ice hockey tournament that came as a smorgasbord of sports, dance and music and colours for the Spitians, who otherwise remain in the icy isolation of their hamlets for six months, quipped Tashi, a local.
The athletes say the ice hockey consists of three 20-minute periods with a 15-minute intermission after the first and the second periods. Team change ends for each period. If a tie occurs in a medal round game, a five minute sudden- victory overtime period is played.
In the gold medal game, a 20-minute sudden-victory is played subsequent to another 15-minute intermission. In the event of a tie after any sudden victory, a penalty shootout competition takes place to decide the winner.
(Kuldeep Chauhan is Editor HimbuMail ) Email:
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