LAHORE: After a lapse of 34 years, the second phase of construction on the International Squash Complex started here on Tuesday.

Squash legend Jahangir Khan along with Punjab Sports Minister Faisal Ayub, Punjab Sports and Youth Affairs Secretary Muzaffar Khan Sial and Sports Board Punjab Director General Khizar Afzaal Chaudhry inaugurated the project.

Jahangir Khan said it was his dream to see an international squash complex in Lahore and now it would come true. He said there was enough squash talent in the country and hopefully the complex would produce many world leaders of the game in the future. He thanked the chief minister for releasingfundsfor the project.

Work on the squash complex was started in 1991 by the federal government but it was stopped two years later. It remained suspended as the objection was raised that the project had started without the completion of the PC-I. In 2020, when the work was again started by the Punjab Sports Department, the cost of construction had increased manifolds. So far Rs380m had been spent on the first phase (grey structure).

When the project was started in 1991, the estimated cost was Rs10m. Now another budget of Rs500m has been released to complete the second phase of the project.

Speaking on the occasion, the sports minister said the Squash Complex was a gift from the Chief Minister for squash players. `The coveted project will be completedin a period of six months at a cost of Rs500m`.

He said six practice courts and one court for the international matches would be available for the players.

`The international squash court will be named after Jahangir Khan while the remaining courts will also be dedicated to other squash stars ofthe country,` he said and added that Mr Khan would be requested to hone skills of squash players in the complex.

The minister said the sports department would honour British Open U-13 champion Sohail Adnan with a scholarship from the Sports Endowment Fund. He said the Punjab government had allocated Rs2bn for the Sports Endowment for the players` scholarship.

After laying the foundation stone of the Complex, the minis-ter and Jahangir, distributed the cheques among top 20 performers of the Inter-Provincial Quaid-iAzam Games and other sports events.

Those athletes who were given cheques are weightlifter Nooh Dastgir Butt (Rsim). Following are the athletes were awarded Sports Endowment Fund cheques: Amman Rehman, Aryaan Rehman, Bilal Maqbool, Shazana Shahid (swimming Platinum category: Rs 70,000 per month for one year); Aysha Waqas (swimming), Saad Shafique Ali Khan (hockey), M Tayyab Sarwar, Zartasha Asghar, MAkmalMehmood (taekwondo), Sujal Zafar (karate) (gold category Rs50,000 per month for one year); Haseeb Masood (hockey), Tayyaba Abbas (squash), Hassan Ali (wrestling) (silver category, Rs 30,000 per month).