Presidential Sports Awards on May 19
The Presidential Sports Awards 2016 conducted under the patronage of the Ministry of Sports and the Department of Sports Development will be held at the BMICH on May 19.
At this gigantic ceremony, fifty three deserving sports personalities from all fields related to sport will be felicitated. Chairman of the project Saman Amarasinghe said “The Ministry has allocated a sum of rupees ten million for this year’s programme and we are hoping to build on the initial effort that we launched last year. The period under scrutiny would be 1 January to 31 December 2016.”
Amarasinghe told the Sunday Times that they have introduced the Junior and Young categories starting from the age of sixteen. Also introduced is the category for the persons with Disability.
Preceding the ceremony would be the conferring of honorary titles for sports personalities of yester-year and they will be – Kreedabhimani, Kreeda Deshoththara, Kreeda Keerthi, Kreeda Lanka Pradeepa, Kreeda Bhushana, Kreeda Rathna and Kreeda Prabha. Once again the chief guests of the ceremony will be President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremasinghe. The first category will be the Presidential Award for the Sports Legend of the Year, where twenty five awards will be on offer. There would be eleven Presidential Awards for Specialised Sports fields. Also there are sixteen other awards to be given away for Sports Journalism and Sports Publications. Last year the Sunday Times bagged award for the Most Outstanding National Newspaper of the Year (English) and the Most Outstanding Sports Journalist of the Year (Print Media – English). The pinnacle of the programme would be the Presidential Award for National Sports Association – Gold, Silver and Bronze.