PANJIM: Curchorem MLA and Chairman of Tourism Development Corporation of Goa Nilesh Cabral has been elected unopposed as the president of Goa Chess Association (GCA) for the year 2017-21.
“Being associated with GCA gives me immense pleasure to return to my younger days and be associated with the youth today and to get to a different section of the society coming out from a non political side”, said the newly elected GCA president Nilesh.
Outgoing president Vinay Tendulkar, President of Dharbandora TCA, voluntarily opted out of the race to bring in the new leadership. It was a historical moment for the GCA as all 12 taluka executive committees and GCA executive committee collectively was elected unopposed following after duly laid down election process was followed.
“Twelve associations in all 12 talukas help to provide importance of chess in every corner of the State. These associations organise various tournaments (state, national, etc) which gives good feedback to the youngsters who get motivated and also get an opportunity to interact with top national and international players”, Cabral said.
Nilesh said that the association will recommend the State government to include the sport as one of the subjects in the school sports period from 4th std.
“Other States like Gujarat, Tamil Nadu have made chess compulsory in their school curriculum. It is a mental game which strengthens the brain of the child. We will also recommend the State government to include chess as a curriculum in PT subject”, he added.
He also said that he will request the state government to increase number of coaches.
“Right now we have only three coaches which are very less. We will recommend to allot at least one State coach in each taluka so that he will not only enhance in his chess career but also hone the skills of the kids interested in following chess. We will also ask for a dedicated space in each taluka where the association will be able to hold regular classes”, he added.
D V Sunder, vice president of the FIDE, has expressed happiness for this historical elections and said it is an humbling experience. He said that all credit goes to the previous team for putting in lot of efforts in developing chess in Goa. Kishor Bandekar is again re-elected unopposed as secretary for current term. He is presently Joint Secretary of All India Chess Goa Chess Association.
Vishwas Pilankar has been elected as new treasurer.
GCA earlier amended its constitution by increasing the committee members from 7 to 12 to have more representation of the Taluka Chess Association of GCA. Ashesh Keni (South) re-elected as vice president along with new faces –Mahesh Candolkar (North), Vasant Naik (North), Shubha Subhash Phaldesai (South).
The Executive Committee shall elect one of them as senior vice president to act as president in the absence of the elected president for any meetings and events.
Subhash Parsekar (Pernem), Satyawan Harmalkar (Bicholim), Sharendra Naik (Cancona), Machindra Desai (Dharbandora) were elected unopposed as new Joint Secretaries. Wilson Cruz (Ponda) has been elected as joint treasurer of the GCA as per the final result declared by the Presiding Officer Subhash Shirodkar. The new committee has taken over the charge in its General Body Meeting held on May 28.
